TRAINING  FOR 
THE  TRENCHES 

A  PRACTICAL  HANDBOOK 

__ BF     --•".•    '      '     '        •  — 

CAPTAIN  •  LESLIE 'VICKERS 


TRAINING  FOR  THE  TRENCHES 
LESLIE  VICKERS 


BRITISH  "TANK"  IN  ACTION 


TRAINING  FOR  THE 
TRENCHES 

A    PRACTICAL    HANDBOOK 

BASED  UPON  PERSONAL  EXPERIENCE 

DURING  THE  FIRST  TWO  YEARS 

OF  THE  WAR  IN  FRANCE 


BY 
CAPTAIN  LESLIE  VICKERS 

LATE  LIEUT.  SEAFORTH  HIGHLANDERS 

LECTURER  IN  TRENCH  WARFARE, 
DEPARTMENT  OF  MILITARY  SERVICE,  COLUMBIA  UNIVERSITY 


NEW  YORK 
GEORGE  H.  DORAN  COMPANY 


COPYRIGHT,  1917, 
BT  GEORGE  H.  DORAN  COMPANY 


PRINTED  IN  THE  UNITED  STATES  OF  AMERICA 


TO 

LIEUT.  GORDON  ALFORD 

OF  THE*"ANZACS." 

A  VERY  GALLANT  SOLDIER,  A  BOYHOOD  FRIEND, 

WHO  MADE  THE  GREAT  SACRIFICE  ON  THE  8OMME, 

AUGUST,  NINETEEN-BIXTEEN 


366703 


INTRODUCTION 

SINCE  the  Great  European  War  broke  out, 
printing  presses  have  been  busy  pro- 
ducing text  books,  handbooks  and  guides 
for  soldiers.  Military  authorities  and  civilians 
alike  have  come  to  realise  that  this  war  has 
changed  many  of  our  old  conceptions  of 
strategy  and  that  it  has  introduced  conditions 
that  are  entirely  unprecedented.  New  methods 
have  had  to  be  devised — sometimes  on  the  field 
itself  in  the  midst  of  the  greatest  difficulties — 
for  meeting  new  and  novel  methods  of  war- 
fare. Every  deadly  engine  of  destruction  has 
called  forth  some  new  invention  to  cope  with 
it.  Soldiers  have  had  to  live  and  fight  under 
conditions  that  to  the  lay  mind,  or  to  the  mind 
of  the  military  men  of  a  few  years  ago,  would 
seem  to  be  impossible.  It  is  reasonable  to 
assume  that  the  inventive  genius  of  the  world 
will  be  turned  more  and  more  in  the  direction 
of  the  problem  of  how  to  construct  still  more 
terrible  machines  of  destruction.  The  next 

vii 


viii  INTRODUCTION 

war,  if  there  be  one,  is  not  likely  to  be  any  less 
fearful  than  the  present,  so  that  the  sol- 
dier who  is  called  upon  to  engage  in  it  will  re- 
quire to  know  the  lessons  that  have  been 
learned  in  this  war.  The  author  hopes  that 
from  a  fairly  long  training  in  England  in 
preparation  for  work  in  France,  and  from 
some  months  in  the  trenches  on  the  Western 
British  front,  he  may  be  able  to  offer  sugges- 
tions that  will  be  of  value  to  men  who  are  train- 
ing themselves  with  a  view  to  becoming  effi- 
cient soldiers.  He  sends  this  little  book  forth, 
not  as  a  treatise  on  war,  nor  yet  as  a  scientific 
handbook.  He  merely  desires  it  to  serve  to 
bring  home  lessons  that  are  sometimes  too 
dearly  bought.  "Experientia  docet"  is  the 
proverb  that  we  used  to  write  in  our  copy 
books,  and  he  will  feel  that  he  is  repaid  if,  from 
his  experience,  others  are  enabled  to  learn. 
While  he  trusts  that  there  will  be  many  veteran 
soldiers  and  instructors  who  will  be  glad  to 
have  this  information  in  convenient  form,  he 
intends  this  little  book  primarily  for  the  use  of 
those  who  are  civilians  in  the  process  of  be- 
coming soldiers. 

L.  V. 


-  CONTENTS 

CHAPTEB  PAOH 

I.  THE  CIVILIAN  AND  THE  SOLDIER  ...  15 

II.  HEALTH 21 

III.  DISEASE 33 

IV.  VERMIN 46 

V.  HEALTH  AND  OFFICERS 50 

VI.  COVER  AND  TRENCHES 62 

VII.  PROTECTION  OF  TRENCHES      ....  80 

VIII.  ARTILLERY  FIRE 90 

IX.  GAS  AND  LIQUID  FIRE 97 

X.  THE  ATTACK — DEFENCE 101 

XI.  THE  ATTACK — OFFENCE 104 

XII.  EQUIPMENT  FOR  THE  FIELD     .     .     .     .  116 

XIII.  TRICKS  FOR  THE  TRENCHES  124 


xii  ILLUSTRATIONS 

FIGURE 

9.  FINISHED  TRENCH  SHOWING  PARAPET  AND 
PARADOS;  FIRING  STEP  OF  EARTH;  FLOOR- 
ING; AND  SHELTER  DUG-OUT  UNDER  PARA- 
DOS   34 

10.  MACHINE  GUN  POSITION  WITH  HEAVY  OVER- 

HEAD COVER 36 

11.  SIMPLE  ENTANGLEMENTS  MADE  OF  BARBED 

WIRE  AND  ROUGH  POSTS 42 

12.  TRENCH  PERISCOPES 46 

13.  SIMPLE  LOOPHOLE  MADE  OF  STEEL  PLATE 

LET  INTO  PARAPET 52 

14.  ORDINARY  HAND  BOMB  WITH  FUSE  LIGHTED 

AUTOMATICALLY  AS  LEVER  Is  RELEASED  .      52 

15.  TRENCH  BOMB   GUN   FIRING  BOMB   WITH 

STEM;  AND  TRENCH  MORTAR  FIRING  LARGE 
BOMB 54 

16.  SIMPLE  GAS  MASK  WITH  FLUTTER  VALVE  OR 

CHECK  VALVE.  AMBULANCE  DOGS  AND 
HORSES  IN  THE  GAS  ZONE  WERE  EQUIPPED 
AS  SHOWN  .  .  ., 56 

17.  BRITISH   SOLDIER   FULLY   EQUIPPED   WITH 

PACK,  ENTRENCHING  TOOL,  SANDBAGS  AND 
STEEL  HELMET  ...  78 


TRAINING  FOE  THE  TRENCHES 


TRAINING  FOR  THE 
TRENCHES 


CHAPTER  I 

THE  CIVILIAN  AND  THE   SOLDIER 

THE  change  from  civilian  to  soldier  is  one 
that  is  not  easily  accomplished.  We 
soon  find  that  there  are  many  new  con- 
ditions to  be  faced,  many  new  and  uncongenial 
tasks  to  be  undertaken,  and  all  sorts  of  strange 
and  novel  regulations  to  which  we  must  render 
the  strictest  obedience.  In  civilian  life  we  be- 
come thoroughly  independent.  We  come  and 
go  more  or  less  as  we  please.  We  do  not  usu- 
ally ask  the  permission  of  any  one  if  we  wish 
to  depart  a  little  from  our  customary  habits. 
Not  since  we  left  school  have  we  answered  to 
roll-calls  to  any  considerable  extent,  and  only 
in  the  summertime,  "for  the  fun  of  it,"  have 
we  done  our  own  housekeeping  and  submitted 
to  domestic  duties.  In  civilian  life  we  have 
been  allowed  to  work  out  our  own  salvation, 

15 


16       TRAINING  FOR  THE  TRENCHES 

and  if  we  have  been  part  of  a  machine  at  all 
it  has  been  a  huge  social  machine  in  which  we 
did  not  figure  as  a  cog  but  rather  as  an  attach- 
ment. 

In  military  life  things  are  all  changed.  We 
become  at  once  cogs  in  the  great  machine.  We 
have  a  definite  work  to  perform.  The  smooth 
running  of  the  plant  depends  on  us.  We  lose 
much  of  our  independence.  We  realise  that 
other  cogs  depend  on  us,  and,  further,  that 
there  are  many  bigger  cogs  who  drive  us  and 
whose  bigness  and  authority  we  must  thor- 
oughly appreciate  and  recognise.  In  my  own 
experience,  after  some  years  of  being  my  own 
master  to  the  degree  that  only  the  professional 
man  understands,  I  found  it  much  to  my  dis- 
like to  be  obliged  to  get  permission  before  I 
could  leave  the  camp  grounds  for  half  an  hour. 
A  sentry  with  a  fixed  bayonet  helped  me  a  little 
in  the  appreciation  of  my  new  circumstances, 
and  when  in  a  few  days'  time  I  was  the  sentry 
myself,  it  did  me  the  world  of  good  and  took 
the  edge  off  my  displeasure.  Again  it  is  not 
to  the  liking  of  the  ordinary  man  to  be  told 
that  he  must  rise  at  a  certain  hour,  and  much 
less  is  it  to  his  liking  to  be  told  that  he  must 
be  in  bed  at  a  certain  hour  after  which  talk- 
ing is  considered  a  misdemeanour  and  is  pun- 


THE  CIVILIAN  AND  THE  SOLDIER     17 

ishable.  But  a  few  weeks  of  enforced  early 
rising  makes  one  give  thanks  for  the  pure  fresh 
air  of  the  small  hours  of  the  day;  and  a  few 
days  of  hard  physical  exertion  in  the  process 
of  training  makes  a  man  glad  to  conform  to 
the  rule  of  early  to  bed,  and  gives  him  reason 
to  class  as  a  nuisance  the  man  who  talks  after 
"Lights  Out"  and  thus  prevents  him  from 
sleeping. 

In  civilian  life,  too,  a  man  usually  chooses 
with  scrupulous  care  his  roommate  or  mates. 
In  the  army  one  may  be  placed  in  a  tent  or 
a  billet  with  men  who  are  by  no  means  con- 
genial, unless  he  is  lucky  enough  to  have  been 
able  to  join  a  group  of  companions  who  form 
a  unit.  But  even  the  experience  of  having  un- 
congenial companions  is  not  altogether  without 
its  compensations ;  for  every  civilian  finds  that 
he  has  need  of  rearranging  his  estimates  of 
men  when  he  enters  the  army.  The  sooner  our 
own  corners  are  rubbed  off  the  better,  and 
many  of  them  are  inevitably  rubbed  off  when 
we  are  ten  or  thirteen  in  a  tent ! 

The  quality  that  is  the  salvation  of  the  volun- 
teer is  his  keenness.  We  volunteer  because  we 
are  keen  and  we  would  be  ashamed  to  be  other- 
wise. The  rules  and  regulations  of  army  life 
are  liable  to  try  our  tempers  and  our  patience. 


18      TRAINING  FOR  THE  TRENCHES 

There  may  come  times  when  we  question  very 
seriously  the  wisdom  of  having  "joined  up." 
There  may  be  occasions  when  we  thoroughly  de- 
spise our  seniors  and  conclude  that  everything 
military  was  arranged  for  our  oppression. 
Bit  by  bit  we  shall  lose  the  conviction  that  we 
"know  it  all"  already,  and  as  knowledge  in- 
creases within  us,  we  shall  appreciate  more  and 
more  the  knowledge  and  experience  of  those 
placed  over  us.  Regulations  and  even  red  tape 
will  be  seen  to  have  a  wise  purpose,  though,  to 
the  end  of  our  days,  we  may  long  for  some  offi- 
cial scissors  to  cut  it. 

The  change  from  civilian  to  soldier  is  pro- 
duced in  one  way  only — THE  LEAENING  OF 
OBEDIENCE.  This  is  the  first  and  last  lesson. 
The  civilian  is  only  obedient  in  certain  ways 
and  to  a  limited  extent.  The  soldier  is  obedi- 
ent in  every  way  and  to  any  extent,  even  to 
death.  It  would  be  wrong  of  me  to  indicate 
that  "the  habit  of  implicit  obedience"  comes 
easily  to  the  average  man.  It  is  difficult  to 
acquire.  But  it  is  the  "sine  qua  non"  of  a 
good  soldier  and  must  be  acquired.  It  is  the 
heart  of  the  system.  Obedience  is  given  to 
some  one  by  every  rank  in  the  army,  from  the 
highest  general  to  the  humblest  private. 

When  we  have  learned  obedience  we  need  to 


THE  CIVILIAN  AND  THE  SOLDIER     19 

learn  discipline — for  the  two  words  do  not  mean 
exactly  the  same  thing.  Discipline  may  be  of 
two  kinds.  First  of  all  there  is  SELF-DIS- 
CIPLINE. This  includes  the  restraint  of  sel- 
fishness; the  cultivation  of  the  spirit  of  com- 
radeship, generosity  and  thoughtfulness ;  the 
cultivation  of  habits  of  moderation  in  smoking, 
drinking,  etc. ;  and  the  elimination  of  those  vices 
that  tend  to  rob  us  of  our  strength  or  impair 
the  clearness  of  our  thinking.  Then  there  is, 
secondly,  ARMY  DISCIPLINE,  which  includes 
obedience,  thoroughness,  common  sense  and  re- 
sourcefulness. This  question  is  dealt  with  at 
length  in  military  handbooks  and  needs  few 
words  from  me. 

The  point  to  remember  is  that  training  for 
modern  war  is  a  serious  business,  not  to  be 
entered  upon  lightly,  nor  regarded  as  a 
1 1  cinch. ' '  A  man  must  first  of  all  be  fit  in  body 
to  be  able  to  withstand  the  many  physical  hard- 
ships that  he  will  be  sure  to  encounter.  Then 
he  must  be  fit  in  mind  to  provide  him  with  the 
imagination  and  the  resourcefulness  that  he  will 
certainly  be  called  on  to  show.  His  heart  must 
be  strong  not  only  in  the  opinion  of  the  surgeon 
but  in  the  opinion  of  those  who  judge  his  "all- 
round  manhood."  He  must  be  trained  in  such 
a  way  that  he  will  be  able  to  stand  not  only  the 


20      TRAINING  FOR  THE  TRENCHES 

physical  but  the  nervous  strain  as  well.  A  visit 
to  the  hospitals  in  England  and  France  will 
provide  the  spectacle  of  row  after  row  of  beds 
containing  men  who  have  never  been  wounded 
but  whose  nerves  have  gone  to  pieces  in  the 
strain  of  modern  warfare. 

Eemember  to  take  your  training  seriously—- 
it pays. 


CHAPTER  H 

HEALTH 

BENJAMIN  FRANKLIN  once  said,  "Be 
sober  and  temperate  and  you  will  be 
healthy."    This  is  in  the  main  true  and 
is  excellent  advice  for  the  soldier.   But  there  are 
ills  that  are  liable  to  affect  the  fighting  man  in 
spite  of  his  temperance  and  sobriety  and  of 
these  we  must  speak. 

The  health  of  men  in  the  army  is,  on  the  aver- 
age, much  better  than  that  of  individuals  out- 
side of  it.  This  is  due  to  many  causes  chief  of 
which  is  the  fact  that  only  healthy  men  are  ad- 
mitted to  the  army.  Then  the  out-of-door  life, 
regular  and  wholesome  food,  sufficient  exercise 
and  "early  to  bed  and  early  to  rise"  tend  to 
keep  him  well.  If  he  enters  the  army  fit,  he 
must  make  it  his  business  to  remain  fit  and  it 
will  be  well  to  remember  that  "an  ounce  of  pre- 
vention is  worth  a  pound  of  cure. ' '  To  preserve 
good  health  is  his  DUTY  for  only  thus  can  he  be- 
come an  efficient  soldier.  If  the  bodily  resist- 
ance is  weakened,  man  becomes  prey  to  the  mil- 

21 


22      TRAINING  FOR  THE  TRENCHES 

lions  of  germs  that  are  to  be  found  in  the  air 
and  even  within  his  own  system.  When  he  is 
healthy  the  body  is  able  to  keep  them  in  subjec- 
tion, but  once  let  him  permit  his  system  to  run 
down  and  these  armies  of  microbes  will  attack 
him  with  all  their  forces. 

Now  let  us  begin  first  of  all  with  BODILY 
CLEANLINESS.  No  soldier  can  come  on  parade 
unless  his  face  and  hands  be  clean.  Shaving, 
though  sometimes  a  bore,  is  an  excellent  method 
of  keeping  the  face  clean  and  fresh.  It  tends  to 
smarten  a  man,  and  officers  are  not  slow  to  pick 
out  the  careful  from  the  slovenly  soldier.  We 
used  to  reserve  the  unpleasant  tasks  of  the 
camp — latrine  duties  amongst  others — for  men 
who  would  not  keep  their  hands  and  faces  clean. 
But  there  are  other  parts  of  the  body  to  which 
it  is  just  as  necessary  to  apply  cleansing  meth- 
ods regularly  even  though  no  military  punish- 
ment follows  the  violation  of  the  rule.  First  of 
these  that  I  would  mention  is  the 

TEETH.  Soldiers,  I  find,  are  very  careless  in 
this  matter  till  the  first  thing  you  know  is  that 
someone  is  absent  from  parade  because  of  the 
toothache.  On  one  occasion  in  the  trenches, 
when  we  were  very  short  handed,  an  officer  had 
to  leave  us  for  a  week  to  go  to  the  hospital  with 
a  badly  abscessed  tooth  due  entirely  to  neglect. 


HEALTH  23 

Cleaning  the  teeth  night  and  morning  freshens 
the  mouth  and  makes  food  taste  better.  An 
excellent  custom  is  to  rinse  the  mouth  after 
every  meal,  and  while  this  may  often  be  incon- 
venient it  can  be  done  if  a  soldier  remembers  to 
wash  his  mou4h  out  with  the  first  sip  of  water 
every  time  he  takes  a  drink.  If  the  teeth  are 
allowed  to  get  very  bad  a  man's  digestion  suf- 
fers and  he  falls  ill.  This  robs  the  army  of  part 
of  its  fighting  strength,  a  result  which  every 
soldier  has  an  interest  in  avoiding. 

HAIB.  No  better  advice  can  be  given  to  the 
soldier  on  this  subject  than  ' '  cut  it  short. ' '  The 
shorter  the  better,  for  when  it  is  short  it  is 
easy  to  keep  clean  both  from  body  dirt  and  ver- 
min. In  this  war  soldiers  have  almost  invari- 
ably had  the  clippers  run  completely  over  their 
heads.  Soap  and  water  are  as  good  for  the  head 
as  for  any  other  part  of  the  body. 

TKUNK.  It  is  not  always  possible  for  soldiers 
to  get  a  shower  or  plunge  every  day,  but  a  small 
sponge  carried  as  part  of  the  equipment  will 
help  a  good  deal.  In  France,  where  the  water 
was  scarce,  we  had  to  make  it  go  a  long  way. 
When  the  enemy  permitted,  I  used  to  get  my 
regular  morning  bath  with  the  aid  of  the  sponge 
and  about  a  saucerful  of  water.  I  felt  like  a 
canary  during  the  process  and  wanted  to  chirp 


m      TRAINING  FOR  THE  TRENCHES 

and  flap  my  wings.  Soldiers  should  be  encour- 
aged to  go  in  swimming  whenever  circumstances 
permit.  To  go  in  swimming  was  not  a  military 
order  in  my  regiment,  but  we  used  to  take  the 
men  to  the  sea  and  then  ask  who  wanted  to  go 
in.  About  eighty  per  cent  of  the  men  would 
volunteer.  Then  we  would  tell  off  the  remaining 
twenty  per  cent  for  vigorous  physical  exer- 
cises and  after  ten  minutes  give  them  the  choice 
of  continuing  or  taking  a  plunge  in  the  sea. 
They  all  went  in!  Men's  objections  to  water 
usually  come  from  habit  and  they  soon  learn  to 
appreciate  its  refreshing  power. 

FEET.  * '  An  army  marches  on  its  stomach ' ' — 
metaphorically,  but  it  marches  on  its  feet,  liter- 
ally, as  every  poor  infantryman  knows.  And  it 
has  to  do  a  good  deal  of  marching  in  war  and 
in  preparation  for  war.  '  *  Eoute  Marches ' '  and 
"Hikes"  are  very  popular  with  the  training 
staff  as  the  soldier  will  find,  and  they  are  usu- 
ally planned  by  the  men  who  ride  horses !  So 
important  did  we  consider  the  care  of  the  feel 
that  we  used  to  have  "Tos  PAKADES"  twice  a 
week  with  the  Doctor  in  attendance.  Men  with 
neglected  feet  were  considered  as  candidates 
for  cookhouse  garbage  duty,  and  were  promptly 
assigned  to  this  task.  In  the  first  place  feet 
must  be  comparatively  clean — soap  and  water 


HEALTH  25 

recommended !  Then  they  should  be  free  from 
corns.  This  is  not  so  easy  to  accomplish.  Par- 
ing with  a  knife  helps,  but  if  they  get  too  bad 
the  doctor  or  the  chiropodist  should  be  con- 
sulted. Another  frequent  source  of  trouble  is 
neglected  toe  -nails.  The  best  way  is  to  cut 
them  straight  across,  not  too  far  down,  but  so 
as  to  keep  them  from  tearing  the  sock  or  cramp- 
ing the  foot  in  the  boot.  Blisters  sometimes 
arise  on  the  feet.  They  should  be  treated  at 
once,  mainly  by  removing  the  cause — which  may 
be  in  the  boot  itself  or  the  sock — and  then  by 
bathing  them  in  a  solution  of  boric  acid.  If  the 
socks  are  kept  oiled,  or  even  if  small  pieces  of 
soap  are  put  into  the  boots,  this  condition  will, 
in  large  measure,  be  avoided.  I  have  seen  many 
a  pitiful  case  of  men  trailing  along  the  road 
well  in  rear  of  their  company,  limping  and  hob- 
bling as  best  they  could,  all  due  to  the  fact  that 
they  had  not  paid  the  attention  to  their  feet  that 
they  must  if  the  feet  are  to  do  the  work  for 
which  the  army  calls. 

A  few  minutes  attention  per  day  given  to 
these  points  will,  I  am  confident,  help  to  pro- 
cure and  maintain  health  for  the  soldier.  But 
all  his  care  will  be  wasted  unless  that  which  he 
takes  inside  his  body  is  wholesome — food  and 
drink.  In  camps  the  soldier  usually  has  all  his 


26       TRAINING  FOR  THE  TRENCHES 

food  cooked  for  him,  and  it  is  the  duty  of  his 
officers  to  see  that  it  is  good  in  quality,  suffi- 
cient in  quantity,  and  reasonably  well  cooked. 
As  the  soldier  does  the  serving  himself,  that  is 
entirely  his  own  lookout.  In  the  trenches  it  is 
not  possible  to  have  things  arranged  as  one  has 
in  camp.  The  regimental  cookers  were  usually 
stationed  about  three  miles  from  the  firing  line 
— for  their  safety — and  all  the  food  was  cooked 
there  and  sent  up  to  the  lines  in  boxes  or  sand- 
bags, and  apportioned  to  the  various  platoons 
according  to  the  number  of  men  on  the  strength. 
Three  times  a  week  the  cooks  were  given  fresh 
meat  to  prepare  for  us — when  the  Government 
says  it  is  fresh  it  is  fresh  even  in  Summer  time 
and  when  the  flies  have  been  busy — and  for  the 
other  days  we  subsisted  on  canned  meats  or 
i  '  bully  beef"  as  it  was  called.  The  meat  was 
either  baked  or  boiled,  though  sometimes  we 
got  a  stew — in  camp  we  got  too  many  stews! 
Potatoes  were  boiled,  usually  in  their  jackets. 
This  food  we  could  heat  in  the  trenches  in  our 
individual  cooking  apparatus,  which  also  served 
to  cook  our  ration  of  bacon  for  breakfast,  while 
in  the  upper  part  of  the  tin  we  made  tea. 

Of  course  in  the  trenches  we  had  to  eat  what- 
ever we  could  get,  but  our  lot  was  relieved  con- 
siderably by  the  arrival  of  delicacies  from  Eng- 


HEALTH  27 

land  by  the  parcel  post.  This  sometimes  sub- 
jected us  to  the  temptation  that  we  were  under 
while  in  training,  and  that  was  to  eat  pastry  and 
suchlike  food,  which,  while  very  appetising,  is 
not  to  be  recommended  as  a  diet  for  the  soldier. 

On  the  question  of  DEINK  my  views  have  be- 
come very  pronounced  since  my  experience  with 
the  army.  Undoubtedly  the  best  universal  drink 
for  the  soldier  is  tea — preferably  weak.  I 
should  say  water  were  it  always  possible  to  get 
water  that  is  pure.  But  during  a  campaign  pure 
water  is  a  luxury.  By  making  the  water  into 
tea  you  make  sure  that  it  gets  boiled,  and  by 
the  addition  of  tea  you  get  a  beverage  that  has 
not  the  insipid  sickly  flavour  of  boiled  or  steri- 
lised water.  Coffee  is  preferred  by  Americans, 
I  know,  but  there  are  dangers  to  be  recognised 
especially  by  those  whose  hearts  are  inclined 
to  be  weak. 

With  regard  to  alcohol  I  would  most  heartily 
recommend  total  abstinence.  I  need  scarcely 
remind  American  readers  that  there  is  not  a 
single  front  rank  baseball  manager  that  allows 
his  men  to  indulge  in  alcohol.  From  my  own 
experience  I  could  tell  of  many  men  who  were 
permanently  rendered  unfit  as  soldiers  through 
foolish  indulgence.  Of  the  men  who  were 
brought  before  the  Colonel  for  more  or  less  seri- 


28       TRAINING  FOR  THE  TRENCHES 

cms  crimes,  90  per  cent  of  them  owed  their  hu- 
miliation directly  to  alcohol,  and  5  per  cent  of 
them  to  alcohol  indirectly.  I  know  that  it  is  pos- 
sible for  some  men  to  take  alcohol  in  modera- 
tion. Not  many  continue  to  do  so,  and  sooner 
or  later  there  is  almost  certain  to  be  an  over- 
indulgence. In  the  British  army  men  were  sen- 
tenced to  the  extreme  penalty — death — for  be- 
ing intoxicated  while  on  active  service  in 
France.  I  say  without  hesitation  that  the  best 
men  I  had  were  the  abstainers  and  the  worst 
men  I  had  were  the  drinkers.  Alcohol  weakens 
the  tissues  of  the  body,  it  lowers  its  vitality  and 
makes  it  an  easy  victim  to  disease,  and  worse 
still,  it  rapidly  obscures  the  mind.  For  a  war 
of  the  kind  that  is  being  waged  in  Europe  a  man 
needs  to  have  his  head  very  clear,  and  this  he 
cannot  do  if  he  is  the  victim  of  the  alcohol  habit. 

Many  total  abstainers  from  alcohol  are 
tempted  to  take  "  gassy "  drinks,  fizzes  and  so 
forth.  These  tend  to  shorten  the  wind  and 
should  therefore  be  avoided. 

If  plain  water  has  to  be  drunk,  care  should 
be  taken  to  see  that  it  is  reasonably  pure,  and 
all  vessels  such  as  water  bottles  should  be  thor- 
oughly rinsed  each  time  before  using. 

When  these  simple  rules  of  eating  and  drink- 
ing are  followed  many  of  the  dangers  incidental 


HEALTH  29 

to  army  life  will  be  avoided,  and  physical  fitness 
established. 

A  kindred  subject  is  that  of  SMOKING.  This 
habit  has  become  so  universal  in  the  British 
army  that  it  is  almost  true  to  say  that  every  one 
smokes.  From-my  own  experience  I  have  seen 
very  few  ill  effects  from  it  except  in  cases  of 
obvious  overindulgence.  But  undoubtedly  it 
is  easy  to  overdo  the  cigarette  business,  and  on, 
this  point  I  would  utter  a  word  of  warning. 
Pipes  are  to  be  preferred,  though  I  admit  it  is 
difficult  to  get  men  to  smoke  anything  else  than 
cigarettes  in  the  trenches.  In  the  monotony  and 
strain  of  trench  life,  and  from  the  need  to  do 
something  to  keep  the  stench  of  decaying  bodies 
from  the  nostrils,  men  do  smoke  to  excess. 
There  is  some  excuse  there,  but  during  training 
at  home  every  man  must  endeavour  to  be  rea- 
sonable in  his  indulgence. 

CLOTHING.  I  have  found  that  men  are  very 
apt  to  load  themselves  up  with  all  sorts  of  use- 
less items  of  apparel.  In  their  endeavour  to 
keep  warm  they  have  often  badly  overdone  it 
with  the  result  that  they  have  found  themselves 
perspiring  and  exhausted  in  the  midst  of  an  im- 
portant piece  of  physical  labour.  Of  course  the 
soldier  will  need  to  see  to  it  that  his  under- 
clothes are  sufficiently  warm  to  keep  out  the 


30       TRAINING  FOR  THE  TRENCHES 

extreme  cold,  but  it  is  better  to  add  something 
to  the  clothing  from  time  to  time — such  as  a 
Cardigan  waistcoat — than  to  be  equipped  per-< 
manently  with  the  heaviest  kind  of  under- 
clothes. Above  all,  avoid  those  garments  that 
are  being  offered  extensively  to  unsuspecting 
men,  and  which,  while  they  will  undoubtedly 
keep  you  warm,  will  also  prevent  the  proper 
perspiration  of  the  body.  The  body  must  be 
allowed  to  perspire  and  the  air  must  be  allowed 
to  carry  off  the  perspiration.  Woollens  are  the 
best  for  this  purpose,  and  though  the  initial  cost 
of  them  is  rather  great,  they  are  worth  it  in  the 
long  run. 

BOOTS.  In  the  paragraph  on  feet  I  couldn't 
help  mentioning  the  matter  of  boots,  but  it  is 
so  important  that,  at  the  risk  of  too  great  repe- 
tition, I  want  to  mention  it. again.  You  must 
have  boots  that  are  right,  otherwise  you  will, 
soon  be  lamed  and  thus  be  out  of  action.  And 
every  man  out  of  action  "  counts  two  on  a  divi- 
sion." We  found  it  advisable  in  France  to  get 
boots  that  were  large  enough  to  accommodate 
the  feet  and  two  pairs  of  socks — one  thin  and 
one  thick  pair.  Into  the  boots  we  poured  a 
small  quantity  of  oil,  or  between  the  socks  we 
put  small  pieces  of  soap  to  keep  the  feet  in  good 
condition.  You  will  find  that  the  feet  must  be 


HEALTH  31 

oiled  if  they  are  to  stand  the  work  of  a  cam- 
paign. 

But  sometimes  injuries  are  caused  to  the  feet 
by  other  parts  of  the  clothing  of  a  soldier.  Men 
frequently  laced  their  puttees  or  leggins  too 
tight  and  found  that  they  suffered  pains  in  the 
feet — the  circulation  was  being  stopped.  This 
rendered  them  very  liable  to  frostbite,  than 
which  there  is  nothing  more  painful.  If  there 
are  signs  of  freezing,  remove  the  boots  as  soon 
as  possible  and  restore  the  circulation.  But  if 
the  feet  are  actually  frozen  the  soldier  is  in  for 
a  long  and  tedious  illness,  and  will  be  lucky  if  he 
does  not  need  to  have  his  feet  amputated.  I  am 
told  that,  during  the  first  campaign  in  the  Car- 
pathians, the  Central  Powers  lost  25,000  men 
per  day  with  frozen  feet. 

Before  leaving  this  subject  to  deal  with  dis- 
eases and  their  avoidance,  I  would  like  to  say 
a  word  or  two  on  the  congenial  subject  of  BEST. 
A  soldier  should  get  as  much  of  it  as  he  can, 
consistent,  of  course,  with  doing  his  duty. 
Never  stand  when  you  could  as  well  be  lying 
down.  Throw  yourself  on  the  ground  whenever 
you  can,  to  rest,  and  let  the  whole  body  relax. 
When  you  are  given  a  rest  on  the  roadside, 
stretch  out  on  your  back  and  breathe  as  deeply 
as  you  can.  Give  your  mind  and  body  alike  a 


32       TRAINING  FOR  THE  TRENCHES 

vacation  and  you  will  feel  the  benefit  of  it  at 
the  end  of  the  day.  Don't  spend  your  hours  of 
beauty  sleep  in  talking — get  that  done  during 
the  day.  Your  body  will  call  for  rest  after  the 
tiring  duties  of  the  day  and  you  should  give  it 
all  the  rest  you  can. 


CHAPTER  III 

DISEASE 

IF  the  rules  of  health  set  forth  in  the  fore- 
going chapter  are  carefully  observed,  the 
soldier  will  be  doing  the  best  he  can  to  keep 
his  body  fit.  He  will  be  building  up  a  reserve 
of  strength  that  will  stand  him  in  good  stead 
should  the  germs  of  disease  find  entrance  into 
his  body.  But  there  are  times  when,  in  spite 
of  all  our  precautions,  these  little  microbes  get 
the  upper  hand,  and  a  long  struggle  against 
them  begins.  The  disease  that  has  been  respon- 
sible for  the  death  of  armies  of  soldiers  is 
ENTERIC  or  TYPHOID  fever.  During  the  cam- 
paign in  South  Africa  the  British  lost  more 
men  through  the  ravages  of  this  disease  than 
through  bullets  and  shells.  But  during  the 
present  war  there  have  been  comparatively  few 
cases  of  enteric,  and  the  number  that  have 
proved  fatal  is  very  small.  For  this  result  we 
have  to  thank  the  medical  profession  that  has 
given  so  much  study  and  care  to  the  perfection 
of  a  method  of  combating  this  disease.  The 

33 


34       TRAINING  FOR  THE  TRENCHES 

secret  has  been  found  to  lie  in  the  inoculation  of 
the  soldier  with  small  doses  of  the  disease  itself 
till  he  becomes  comparatively  immune  to  it.  In- 
oculation was  not  made  compulsory  in  the  first 
armies  that  were  raised  in  England  after  war 
broke  out,  but  it  was  made  compulsory  for  men 
who  desired  to  become  members  of  the  British 
Expeditionary  Force  in  France.  Most  men 
gladly  accepted  this  medical  boon  and  subjected 
themselves  to  this  simple  and  painless  opera- 
tion. But  there  were  others  who  objected,  some- 
times through  fear  of  the  pain,  and  sometimes 
through  what  they  termed  "conscientious  ob- 
jections." Anti-Inoculation  Societies  got  busy 
and  spread  their  wretched  literature  through- 
out the  camps  and  made  men  thoroughly  afraid, 
both  of  the  operation  and  of  its  results.  To 
meet  this  the  War  Office  issued  through  the 
papers  and  by  pamphlets,  information  from  the 
medical  authorities  as  to  the  wonderful  results 
that  had  already  been  achieved.  They  were 
able  to  prove  beyond  all  dispute,  that  of  the  men 
who  caught  the  infection  in  France,  practically 
all  of  those  who  had  been  inoculated  recovered 
— their  cases  being  light — while  those  who  had 
not  been  inoculated  became  easy  victims  to  the 
disease.  As  the  war  has  progressed  these  fig- 
ures have  been  amplified  till  now  there  can  be 


DISEASE  35 

no  question  that  the  use  of  "  Inoculation "  has 
made  this  dread  disease  a  thing  to  be  feared 
less  than  the  measles. 

Officers  adopted  different  methods  in  counter- 
acting the  teaching  of  those  who  tried  to  keep 
the  soldiers  from  submitting.  Some  of  them 
argued  with  the  men  and  told  them  of  the  won- 
derful results  that  had  been  achieved.  Others 
warned  their  men  that  they  would  be  left  behind 
when  the  battalion  went  to  France.  For  my 
own  part  I  adopted  the  method  of  sending  for 
the  medical  men  whose  business  it  was  to  ad- 
minister the  "dose."  When  they  were  all  pre- 
pared I  marched  in  my  men  from  some  light 
fatigue  work  in  which  they  had  been  engaged, 
told  them  to  take  off  their  coats  and  roll  up 
their  sleeves,  and  three  at  a  time  they  appeared 
before  the  waiting  surgeons.  The  business  was 
over  in  no  time.  I  marched  them  off  to  a  place 
where  I  could  talk  to  them  and  then  acquainted 
them  with  the  advantages  of  inoculation.  The 
announcement  of  forty-eight  hours'  freedom 
from  drill  for  the  whole  company  to  let  their 
arms  limber  up  put  the  few  that  were  disgrun- 
tled into  good  spirits  again,  and  I  was  able  to 
report  to  the  0.  C.  that  100  per  cent  of  my 
men  were  willing  to  be  inoculated — and  had 
been  inoculated!  So  little  did  any  of  them 


36       TRAINING  FOR  THE  TRENCHES 

suffer  from  its  effects  that  they  readily  lined 
up  in  ten  days  time  when  they  were  to  receive 
the  second  dose.  At  intervals  of  two  or  three 
months  in  France  the  operation  was  repeated 
and  I  never  had  a  single  man  on  the  sick  list 
from  enteric! 

Now,  while  inoculation  is  excellent  and  should 
be  insisted  on  in  all  armies,  both  for  the  sake 
of  the  individual  soldier  and  of  those  who  as- 
sociate with  him,  every  possible  precaution 
should  be  taken  by  the  soldier  even  after  this 
has  been  done.  All  water  for  drinking  should 
be  looked  upon  with  suspicion.  Never  take  any 
chances  for  the  sake  of  getting  a  hasty  drink. 
Many  communities  have  water  supplies  that  are 
admirable  and  when  military  operations  are  car- 
ried on  there,  the  difficulties  disappear.  On  the 
other  hand  many  places  have  the  most  abom- 
inable water  supply  systems.  Where  we  were 
in  France,  the  country  was  very  flat,  and  conse- 
quently the  drainage  poor.  The  buildings  that 
housed  the  human  beings  and  the  cattle  and 
pigs  on  the  farms  were  as  a  rule  all  built  around 
a  "midden"  into  which  flowed  all  the  refuse. 
In  many  cases  the  family  water  supply,  a  well, 
was  dug  within  three  feet  of  this  cesspool,  so 
that  the  drainage  from  the  latter  was  almost 
sure  to  reach  the  former.  This  is  ' l  asking  for ' ' 


FIGURE  10: 

Machine  gun  position  with  heavy  overhead  cover. 


DISEASE  37 

enteric,  and  some  men  fell  victims  to  it  before 
they  could  be  made  to  realise  the  danger.  The 
best  rule  to  follow,  as  we  all  soon  learned,  was 
to  get  our  drinking  water  exclusively  from  the 
army  water  wagons,  for  there  the  water  had 
been  treated  and  the  danger  lessened.  At  times 
we  could  not  get  to  the  water  carts  and  a  cer- 
tain degree  of  risk  had  to  be  run. 

Not  only  with  water  has  the  greatest  care  to 
be  taken,  but  also  with  food.  Flies  are  noto- 
rious carriers  of  disease,  and  consequently  sol- 
diers must  see  to  it  that  no  food  is  left  uncov- 
ered. Nor  should  food  ever  be  placed  near, 
latrines  or  any  place  where  there  is  decaying 
matter. 

With  universal  inoculation,  and  with  a  care- 
ful following  of  these  simple  rules  laid  down, 
the  ancient  scourge  of  the  army  loses  much  of 
its  terror.  The  task  of  combating  it  lies  mainly 
with  the  medical  and  sanitary  staff,  though  the 
common  soldier  must  also  play  his  part  of  care- 
fulness. Some  men  carried  small  sterilisers 
with  them.  This  practice  is  not  to  be  recom- 
mended for  it  is  very  difficult  to  keep  these  little 
utensils  clean,  and  then  they  themselves  become 
harmful.  Tabloid  sterilisers  I  have  found  to  be 
effective  in  an  emergency. 

Those  who  have  followed  the  history  of  the 


38       TRAINING  FOR  THE  TRENCHES 

war  will  remember  how  the  Serbian  Army  was 
threatened  with  extinction  through  the  deadly 
disease  called  TYPHUS.  There  is  no  doubt  that 
the  army  and  most  of  the  civil  population  would 
have  been  wiped  out  had  it  not  been  for  the 
timely  assistance  that  that  brave  little  nation 
received  from  medical  men  and  women  through- 
out the  world,  notably  America.  Many  of  these 
brave  souls  made  the  final  great  sacrifice  in 
their  endeavour  to  stamp  out  this  disease.  Then 
again  its  horrors  have  been  more  recently 
brought  to  our  notice  through  the  revelations 
of  the  conditions  at  Wittenberg  Camp  in  Ger- 
many. The  story  that  Captain  Vidal  and  Major 
Priestly,  Officers  of  the  Royal  Army  Medical 
Corps,  had  to  tell  of  their  living  death  in  that 
awful  internment  camp,  brought  home  to  the 
British  people  and  then  to  the  world,  the  fright- 
fulness  of  that  disease,  as  well  as  the  inhuman- 
ity of  certain  German  medical  officials.  Fortu- 
nately, typhus  has  been  little  known  in  Western 
Europe,  and  it  is  possible  that  soldiers  in  this 
country  will  never  know  its  ravages.  But  all 
the  same  it  is  as  well  to  be  prepared  for  it,  and 
to  know  the  methods  of  preventing  its  outbreak. 
It  is  a  disease  that  is  carried  by  flees  and  lice 
and  consequently  the  most  that  can  be  said  in  a 
work  of  this  kind  is  to  recommend  the  greatest 


DISEASE  39 

pains  in  the  removal  of  these  creatures  from 
the  body  should  they  ever  take  tip  their  resi- 
dence there.  I  refer  the  reader  to  the  chapter 
on  "Vermin"  for  methods  of  combating 
"Lice." 

DYSENTERY,-  ENTEKITIS,  and  COLITIS.  These 
names  are  applied  to  various  kinds  and  grades 
of  stomach  troubles,  between  which  it  is  diffi- 
cult for  the  common  soldier  to  differentiate,  and 
which  show  themselves  with  most  distressing 
effects.  They  come,  usually,  from  drinking  bad 
water  or  eating  bad  food.  Even  with  the  great- 
est care  that  the  Commissariat  could  take,  there 
were  occasions  when  food  unfit  for  human  con- 
sumption was  served  to  the  troops.  In  the 
trenches  it  was  not  to  be  wondered  at  that  we 
were  stricken  with  these  diseases,  for  the  flies 
that  infested  the  trenches  and  lived  on  the  dead 
bodies  there,  favoured  us  with  many  visits  at 
food  time  and  poisoned  the  latter  for  us.  There 
is  no  way  that  I  know  of  to  prevent  it,  and  the 
sufferer  will  be  well  advised  to  report  to  the 
medical  officer  for  skilled  treatment.  Cases  of 
dysentery  were  not  very  frequent  in  France, 
but  they  were  in  Gallipoli  where  the  food  sup- 
ply left  much  to  be  desired. 

TETANUS  is  a  disease  that  is  brought  about  by 
infection  which  enters  the  system  through  a 


40      TRAINING  FOR  THE  TRENCHES 

wound.  In  the  early  part  of  the  war  it  occurred 
only  too  frequently  till,  in  this  case  also,  the 
skill  of  the  medical  profession  provided  us  with 
a  serum  to  combat  it.  The  universal  practice 
now  is  to  inoculate  with  anti-tetanic  serum  just 
as  soon  as  possible  after  a  wound  has  been  re- 
ceived. By  this  means  tetanus,  like  enteric,  is 
rapidly  ceasing  to  be  regarded  as  a  menace. 

I  have  no  intention  of  exhausting  the  whole 
category  of  diseases  to  which  man — and  there- 
fore the  soldier — is  heir,  but  simply  to  touch 
upon  those  that  are  most  likely  to  occur  in  a 
campaign.  The  foregoing  list  includes,  I  be- 
lieve, all  the  most  likely,  but  to  them  I  should 
like  to  add  these  two — SMALLPOX  and  CHOLERA. 
To  deal  first  with  smallpox,  we  can  say,  for- 
tunately, that  it  is  rare.  This  is  due  in  large 
part  to  the  almost  universal  provision  of  vacci- 
nation, which  should  be  insisted  upon  in  an 
army.  Cholera  is  of  rare  occurrence,  and  noth- 
ing can  be  done  to  ward  it  off  except  to  follow 
carefully  the  ordinary  rules  of  health  and  sani- 
tation. Should  it,  unfortunately,  break  out,  the 
army  must  place  itself  unreservedly  in  the 
hands  of  medical  authorities  who  are  especially 
qualified  to  deal  with  it. 

There  is  one  other  disease  that  has  made  its 
effects  felt  on  almost  every  army,  and  which  it 


DISEASE  41 

has  been  found  impossible  to  thoroughly  elimi- 
nate. The  hands  of  those  who  would  lessen  its 
influence  are  to  a  great  extent  tied,  because  in 
the  past,  the  only  method  that  has  been  permis- 
sible to  eliminate  venereal  disease  has  been 
what  I  shall  call  "the  Moral  method" — the  ap- 
peal to  morality  and  the  intelligence  of  the  in- 
dividual soldier.  We  have  used  this  excellent 
and  praiseworthy  method  for  generations,  but 
it  has  never  been  found  capable  of  eradicating 
the  evil.  Some  other  means,  from  an  army 
point  of  view,  has  obviously  to  be  resorted  to. 
But  even  to  discuss  the  matter,  one  runs  the  risk 
of  being  ruled  out  of  court  by  those  who  will 
admit  none  but  the  aforementioned  "moral  ar- 
gument." 

When  the  first  Expeditionary  Force  went  to 
France,  the  late  Lord  Kitchener,  then  Secretary 
of  State  for  War,  issued  an  appeal  to  the  men, 
in  which  he  besought  them  to  be  on  their  guard 
against  two  of  the  evils  that  lessen  the  efficiency 
of  soldiers — wine  and  women.  The  men  who 
fell  victims  to  wine  or  whiskey  or  other  forms 
of  alcoholic  intemperance,  were  punished,  first 
of  all  with  imprisonment,  and  then,  when  it  was 
seen  that  this  penalty  did  not  meet  the  case,  the 
death  penalty  was  imposed  for  such  as  became 
intoxicated  when  at  their  post  of  duty.  Ob- 


42      TRAINING  FOR  THE  TRENCHES 

viously  the  army  cannot  afford  to  have  as  its 
guardians  men  who  cannot  keep  sober.  Those 
who  fell  victims  to  loose  women  and  contracted 
venereal  diseases — and  it  is  beyond  a  doubt  that 
most  of  the  women  who  follow  an  army  are  dis- 
eased— had  to  be  withdrawn  from  their  posi- 
tions and  sent  back  to  the  bases  to  hospitals. 
Every  man,  therefore,  who  violated  Lord  Kitch- 
ener 's  advice,  was  playing  into  the  hands  of  the 
enemy  to  this  extent  that  he  was  taking  the  risk 
of  contracting  a  disease  which  would  rob  the 
army  of  his  services.  My  own  Colonel  used  not 
to  mince  words  on  this  subject  but  used  to  say 
that  such  men  might  just  as  well  go  over  to  the 
enemy  at  once.  But  with  every  kind  of  pleading 
and  threat  on  the  part  of  officers,  it  was  found 
that  there  were  men  who  disregarded  their  ad- 
vice. A  soldier's  pay  automatically  stops  under 
these  circumstances,  and  at  first  it  was  the  cus- 
tom to  acquaint  his  family  with  the  fact  that  he 
had  been  sent  to  such  and  such  a  hospital,  and 
the  people  of  England  soon  got  to  know  the 
purpose  of  these  hospitals,  and  many  a  home 
suffered  shame  from  the  indiscretions  of  the 
men  who  represented  them  in  France.  When 
the  Australian  troops  were  quartered  near 
Cairo — than  which  there  are  few  more  immoral 
cities  in  the  world — venereal  cases  were  fre- 


FIGURE  11: 

Simple  entanglements  made  of  barbed  wire  and  rough  posts." 


DISEASE  43 

quent,  in  spite  of  the  admonitions  of  the  com- 
batant officers  and  of  the  medical  staff.  What 
was  to  be  done?  Every  effort  was  made  to  re- 
strain the  men  and  keep  them  out  of  the  notori- 
ous red  light  district,  but  case  after  case  of  the 
disease  turned  up.  Eventually  some  of  the  med- 
ical men  hit  upon  the  scheme  of  establishing 
at  the  entrance  to  the  various  camps,  tents  to 
which  men  could  go  on  their  return  from  the 
city.  In  those  tents  there  was  a  representative 
of  the  Army  Medical  Corps  equipped  with  all 
the  latest  appliances  in  the  form  of  prophylac- 
tics, and  these  were  administered  without 
charge  and  without  question,  even  as  to  name, 
to  all  who  sought  this  method  of  protecting 
themselves  after  acts  of  indiscretion.  The  re- 
sult was  very  gratifying  from  the  medical 
standpoint,  for  the  number  of  those  who  con- 
tracted the  disease  rapidly  declined  and  the 
efficiency  of  the  army  was  maintained  at  a  cor- 
respondingly high  standard.  Of  course  a  pro- 
test was  immediately  entered  by  those  who  were 
particularly  interested  in  the  morals  of  the  men, 
and  the  charge  was  made  that  it  was  putting  a 
premium  on  immorality.  For  my  own  part,  in- 
terested in  both  of  these  matters,  I  have  come  to 
the  conclusion  that  the  old  methods  have  failed, 
and  that  I  would  rather  have  an  army  immoral 


44      TRAINING  FOR  THE  TRENCHES 

and  well  than  an  army  immoral  and  diseased. 
As  human  nature  is  constituted  at  present  I  can 
see  no  alternative,  though  I  believe  it  to  be  our 
bounden  duty  to  continue  to  urge  the  need  of 
self-restraint.  I  do  not  fear  that  these  words 
will  be  taken  to  cast  a  slur  upon  any  army,  for 
those  of  us  who  are  not  blind  are  perfectly 
aware  that  the  same  kind  of  immorality  exists 
among  civilian  populations  as  in  armies.  For 
those  men  who  shall  read  these  words  of  mine 
I  would  with  all  the  force  at  my  command  urge 
the  close  following  of  the  precepts  of  Lord 
Kitchener. 

A  kindred  problem  with  which  the  authorities 
sometimes  have  to  deal  is  that  of  "unnatural 
men."  Records  of  the  German  Army  before 
the  war  contained  many  examples  of  this  most 
revolting  form  of  perversion.  In  the  British 
Armies  that  were  raised  at  the  outbreak  of  the 
war,  several  cases  occurred,  the  offenders  being 
punished  with  terms  of  imprisonment  varying 
from  seven  to  fifteen  years  with  hard  labour — 
much  too  lenient. 

The  whole  problem  is  most  difficult  to  deal 
with,  and  any  one  who  attempts  to  deal  with  it 
risks  public  censure.  Yet  the  problem  must  be 
faced,  nevertheless,  and  the  sooner  we  apply 
sane  methods  to  its  solution,  the  better.  Of 


DISEASE  45 

course  views  will  differ  as  to  what  constitutes 
sane  methods,  but  I  am  convinced  from  my  own 
experience  with  soldiers  that  the  method  out- 
lined above  is  a  good  one.  We  must  not,  how- 
ever, fail  to  emphasise  the  dangers  that  men 
run.  They  must  be  taught  the  folly  of  it.  We 
must  make  it  plain  to  them  that  it  is  not  worth 
the  candle  to  run  the  risk  of  contracting  the 
most  horrible  diseases  that  even  our  advanced 
medical  science  can  never  cure  with  certainty, 
for  the  sake  of  a  brief  gratification.  A  man's 
whole  life  may  be  ruined ;  his  innocent  children 
afflicted  with  a  loathsome  disease ;  his  wife  made 
to  endure  years  of  physical  and  mental  torment 
as  the  price  of  that  foolish  act.  Were  this  book 
a  moral  treatise  I  should  spend  time  in  driving 
this  point  home  with  more  force.  But  as  the 
object  I  desire  to  achieve  is  to  show  men  how 
they  can  become  soldiers  and  remain  fit,  it  must 
suffice  to  say  again  that  the  surest  way  to  lay 
up  misery  for  yourself,  to  render  yourself  un- 
fit to  remain  at  your  soldier  tasks  and  thus  in- 
crease the  odds  of  the  enemy  against  your  side 
is  to  run  the  risk  of  venereal  disease  through 
contact  with  women. 


CHAPTER  IV 

VERMIN 

I  FEEL  that  no  hints  on  health  would  be  com- 
plete without  some  brief  reference  to  the 
"terrors  of  the  trenches " — LICE.  A 
learned  Professor  of  one  of  the  Universities  of 
England  published  a  little  book  whose  exact 
title  I  have  forgotten  but  which  was  something 
like  this — "  Flees,  Lice  and  Bugs,  or,  the  Little 
Brothers  of  the  Prussian. ' '  That  is  pretty  hard 
on  the  enemy — or  the  lice — but  it  serves  to  em- 
phasise one  important  point  and  that  is,  that 
the  ravages  of  these  vermin  is  so  great  that  they 
can  well  be  said  to  be  fighting  the  same  cause  as 
the  enemy.  In  spite  of  all  a  soldier  can  do,  lice 
are  sure,  sooner  or  later,  to  overtake  him.  They 
make  their  nests  in  the  straw  upon  which  he 
throws  himself  when  fatigued,  or  in  the  walls 
of  houses,  or  on  other  human  beings,  and  con- 
tact is  almost  sure  to  bring  them.  They  are 
most  interesting  little  pets  whose  sole  interest 
in  life  seems  to  be  to  lay  eggs  and  thus  make 
sure  that  their  race  shall  be  perpetuated.  The 

46 


BOX      PELRISCOPC- 

WtTH          C>»MOCUUHRo 


WITH 


FINISHED? 


FIGURE  12: 

Trench  periscopes. 


VERMIN  47 

female  louse  takes  up  her  abode  upon  the  sol- 
dier's body  and  immediately  sets  herself  to  an 
egg  laying  competition.  If  she  gets  five  min- 
utes start  of  her  victim  she  lays  up  for  him 
weeks  of  trouble,  and  the  only  thing  to  do  is  to 
go  after  her  aricl  her  eggs  as  soon  as  her  pres- 
ence is  made  known.  I  discovered  my  first 
louse  while  I  was  at  luncheon  in  the  trenches. 
I  seized  the  spot  on  my  arm  where  I  believed 
her  to  be,  and  calling  to  my  orderly  hurried  off 
to  the  fields  some  distance  behind  the  lines. 
There  we  began  the  hunt  which  ended,  I  am 
happy  to  be  able  to  say,  in  her  decease.  But  the 
eggs  had  been  laid  and  not  for  weeks  did  I  suc- 
ceed in  ridding  myself  of  these  unwelcome 
boarders.  I  was,  much  against  my  will,  used 
as  a  perambulating  incubator,  and  only  the 
greatest  vigilance  served  to  rid  me  of  the  pests. 
It  was  our  custom,  as  soon  as  we  were  re- 
lieved from  the  trenches  for  a  spell  of  a  few 
days,  to  turn  all  the  men  out  into  a  field  and 
bid  them  1 1  Hunt ! ' '  I  used  then  to  walk  around 
amongst  the  men  and  enquire  of  them  what 
luck  they  had  had.  "Two,"  "Seven,"  "Nine- 
teen," etc.,  were  the  frequent  replies.  One  of 
the  saddest  men  I  have  ever  seen  replied  "None, 
Sir. ' '  His  unhappiness  was  due  to  the  fact  that 
he  was  perfectly  well  aware  that  there  were 


48       TRAINING  FOR  THE  TRENCHES 

some  there  to  be  caught,  but  that  he  had  not  yet 
had  the  luck  to  get  them. 

As  to  means  of  combating  them,  the  best  is 
constant  vigilance.  Make  sure  that  not  only 
the  live  lice  are  killed  but  that  the  eggs  as  well 
are  destroyed,  say  with  the  ash  of  a  lighted 
cigarette.  The  next  thing  to  remember  is  that 
body  lice  are  opposed  to  cleanliness,  and  that 
the  oftener  you  can  wash  yourself,  the  more 
you  inconvenience  them.  Gasoline  squirted 
over  the  body  and  the  clothes  also  serves  to  dis- 
courage them.  Some  thin  cotton  shirts  covered 
with  a  solution  of  carbolic,  had  a  good  effect, 
and  at  the  least  they  served  as  another  barrier 
to  the  little  rascals  before  they  could  reach  the 
body. 

Since  I  returned  to  this  country,  a  manufac- 
turer of  vermin  killers  told  me  that  the  follow- 
ing method  will  be  found  effective:  Take  a 
goose  quill  and  seal  up  one  end.  Put  in  half 
an  inch  of  mercury,  and  then  seal  the  other  end 
making  a  little  phial  of  about  an  inch  and  a  half 
in  length.  Sew  this  to  the  clothes  under  each 
armpit  and  round  the  belt  line.  As  to  whether 
this  will  work  I  do  not  know,  for  I  am  glad  to 
be  able  to  say  that  I  have  not  needed  to  test  the 
theory  since  I  returned  to  America. 

FLEAS  are  not  so  common,  but  when  they  oc- 


VERMIN  49 

cur,  they  must  be  hunted  with  the  same  vigi- 
lance as  lice,  and  the  same  methods  apply  to 
their  extermination.  As  carriers  of  typhus, 
they  are  particularly  to  be  dreaded. 


CHAPTER  V 

HEALTH  AND  OFFICEES 

SO  far  I  have  been  dealing  with  disease  from 
the  point  of  view  of  the  individual  and  I 
have  said  nothing  of  the  duties  of  officers 
towards  their  men  in  this  respect.    A  word  on 
the  subject  may  not  be  out  of  place. 

When  the  new  armies  were  formed  in  Eng- 
land at  the  outbreak  of  war  it  was  summer  time 
and  the  new  troops  were  placed  in  tents  in  open 
fields.  The  lessons  of  camp  life  were  difficult 
for  many  of  these  men  to  learn,  and  some  of  the 
experience  that  was  obtained  was  bought 
dearly.  It  will  occur  to  every  soldier  that  the 
greatest  care  must  be  paid  to  the  cleanliness  of 
the  lines.  Men  are  often  too  lazy  to  carry  their 
scraps  to  the  proper  garbage  pails,  and  care- 
lessly throw  them  around  in  the  neighbourhood 
of  the  tents.  In  fine  weather  they  can  be  easily 
seen  and  the  culprits,  when  discovered,  can  be 
made  to  clean  up  all  the  lines.  When  the  cul- 
prits cannot  be  discovered,  whole  companies 
have  to  be  put  to  this  fatigue  work.  In  wet 

so 


HEALTH  AND  OFFICERS  51 

weather  it  is  worse,  for  the  particles  of  meat 
and  bread  get  trodden  into  the  ground  and  be- 
fore long  there  arises  a  stench  from  them. 
Sometimes,  too,  rats  and  mice  are  encouraged 
by  this  careless  method.  We  used  to  find  that 
certain  men  Who  had  an  inherent  objection  to 
fresh  air,  would  eat  all  their  meals  within  the 
tents.  This  practice  must  be  stopped  at  all 
costs.  Bring  the  men  into  the  open  and  let 
them  stay  there  and  they  will  be  all  the  better 
for  it.  It  is  excusable  for  them  to  remain  in 
the  tents  during  rain  but  at  no  other  time.  The 
inspecting  officer  would  frequently  find  pieces  of 
bacon  and  butter  and  cheese  trodden  into  the 
ground  on  which  the  men  had  to  sleep. 

The  lines  must  be  kept  clean.  Officers  will 
be  well  advised  to  assign  liberal  fatigue  work 
to  the  men  who  are  guilty  of  messing  up  the 
lines,  and  littering  them  with  particles  of  food, 
papers,  cigarette  and  cigar  ends,  etc.  The  reg- 
ular sanitary  squad  cannot  be  expected  to  do 
its  work  unless  the  soldiers  themselves  are  made 
to  co-operate.  It  is  a  good  thing  to  encourage 
the  spirit  of  rivalry  between  units,  and  men  can 
often  be  jollied  on  into  keeping  their  lines  neat 
and  tidy  by  pointing  out  to  them  lines  that  are 
better  kept — and  sometimes  praising  them  when 
their  lines  are  up  to  the  required  standard.  We 


52       TRAINING  FOR  THE  TRENCHES 

found  that  a  good  many  of  the  men  had  quite  an 
artistic  instinct,  and  would  use  up  the  old  bot- 
tles and  stones  from  around  the  camp  to  execute 
the  most  beautiful  designs  representing  the 
battalion  colours  or  the  flags  of  the  allied  na- 
tions. 

We  also  met  with  considerable  difficulty  in 
getting  men  to  thoroughly  air  the  tents.  The 
flaps  of  round  tents  should  be  rolled  up  just  as 
early  as  is  possible  each  morning.  A  good  plan 
is  to  " strike"  individual  rows  of  tents  occa- 
sionally and  give  the  ground  a  thorough  airing 
and  disinfecting.  We  followed  this  plan  with 
tents  which  contained  notoriously  lazy  men  who 
would  not  rise  at  the  proper  time  and  developed 
the  habit  of  leaving  the  flaps  of  the  tents  down. 
They  were  awakened  by  the  Orderly  Corporal 
in  the  usual  course  of  events  and  given  ten  min- 
utes in  which  to  appear  outside  their  tents. 
Promptly  at  the  expiration  of  this  time  a  squad 
arrived  on  the  scene  and,  undoing  all  their  guy 
ropes,  let  the  tents  down  very  suddenly  on  their 
heads.  It  is  very  provoking  to  have  a  mass  of 
canvas  come  about  your  ears  in  this  way,  and 
the  slackers  soon  learned  the  only  way  to 
avoid  it. 

When  an  army  has  to  live  in  tents,  a  certain 
amount  of  dampness  is  almost  certainly  inevi- 


LOOP   HOLT- 


FIGURE  13: 

Simple  loophole  made  of  steel  plate  and  let  into  parapet. 

FIGURE  14: 

Ordinary  hand  bomb  with  fuse  lighted  automatically  as  lever  is 
released. 


HEALTH  AND  OFFICERS  53 

table.  But  if  proper  drains  are  dug  around 
them,  and  every  advantage  taken  of  the  sun- 
light, much  can  be  done  to  avoid  what  fre- 
quently ends  in  rheumatism  or  pneumonia. 
It  pays  to  construct  good  cinder  roads  in  all  the 
camp  lines  anM  to  see  to  it  that  the  approaches 
to  the  individual  tents  are  prepared  in  the  same 
way.  When  we  were  first  dumped  down  in  a 
field  of  clay  in  the  Midlands  of  England  and 
told  to  prepare  it  for  the  horse  lines  to  accom- 
modate the  sixteen  hundred  horses  that  were 
due  in  a  few  days,  we  were  faced  with  a  colossal 
task.  We  were  all  turned  into  navvies,  and  long 
before  we  even  had  shelter  for  the  horses  they 
had  arrived.  It  was  a  most  tedious  business 
to  construct  lines  for  them  in  December  in 
England,  and  we  had  to  cart  many  hundreds  of 
tons  of  cinders  and  rock  to  make  the  place  pos- 
sible. For  weeks  we  worked  at  it,  and  there 
were  complaints  from  the  men  that  they  had 
not  joined  the  army  to  be  navvies.  They  had 
joined  it  to  fight,  so  they  said.  But  when  the 
stables  were  finished  and  they  could  approach 
the  lines  over  nice  smooth  dry  roads  they  rea- 
lised that  their  labour  had  not  been  in  vain. 
There  is  usually  a  fitting  return  in  health  from 
all  the  labour  invested  in  the  preparation  of  a 
good  camp. 


54       TRAINING  FOR  THE  TRENCHES 

Another  place  in  which  officers  and  non-com- 
missioned officers  must  be  on  the  alert  for  filth, 
is  the  cook  house.  This  is  true  in  winter  as  well 
as  in  summer  time.  It  has  been  my  experience 
that  the  laziest  and  dirtiest  men  volunteer  for 
the  task  of  cook.  The  reason  is  that  they  are 
able  to  get  the  choicest  portions  for  themselves, 
be  free  from  the  bore  of  attending  drills  and 
parades,  and  get  a  little  higher  pay,  besides 
what  they  can  get  from  the  soldiers  on  the  side 
for  little  favours.  In  an  army  such  as  was 
formed  in  England  at  the  beginning  of  the  war 
it  was  impossible  to  get  enough  trained  cooks 
for  the  work,  and  all  sorts  of  men  were  run  in 
for  the  job.  Many  of  them  were  thoroughly 
lazy  and  incompetent.  There  was,  of  course,  a 
rooted  objection  to  calling  in  the  aid  of  women 
— though  few  of  us  ever  think  of  employing 
men  to  do  our  cooking  in  private  life — and  when 
we  suggested  it  for  the  purpose  of  improving 
the  grade  of  our  food  in  the  Officers'  Mess,  we 
were  met-  with  the  reply  that  it  had  never  been 
done.  That  was  the  reason  for  keeping  out  a 
good  many  reforms  in  Dear  Old  England.  But 
by  strategy  on  our  part,  and  by  the  eventual 
demands  of  the  stomachs  concerned  that  some 
change  be  made,  we  were  able  to  introduce  a 
woman  manager  for  the  mess  kitchen.  She  re- 


FIGURE  15: 

Above    is    trench    bomb    gun    firing   bomb    with    stem;    below 
trench   mortar  firing  large   bomb. 


HEALTH  AND  OFFICERS  55 

formed  everything,  including  the  costs  of  the 
food.  Our  mess  bills  were  considerably  re- 
duced, the  food  was  better  cooked,  and  we  got 
a  variety  that  had  never  seemed  to  occur  to 
the  late  robbers  that  we  had  employed.  When 
England  began  to  feel  the  want  of  fighting  men, 
it  entered  the  brains  of  some  of  the  Brass  Hat 
officials  that  this  was  a  sphere  in  which  the 
women  could  well  supplant  the  men — and 
woman  came  into  her  own  again,  at  least  in 
part.  That  was  a  job  that  women  could  do  well, 
but  it  was  a  long  time  before  we  would  agree  to 
let  them. 

But  whether  men  or  women  are  in  charge  of 
this  important  department  of  an  army,  the  duty 
will  still  devolve  upon  the  officers  to  see  that 
the  cookhouses  are  kept  clean  and  that  the  food 
is  up  to  the  proper  standard.  One  case  oc- 
curred in  a  camp  near  London  where  they  were 
following  the  principle  of  allowing  outside 
caterers  to  supply  the  food,  in  which  the  Or- 
derly Officer  of  the  day  just  managed  to  stop 
in  time,  the  service  to  the  men  of  meat  that  was 
diseased.  The  desire  to  make  a  little  addi- 
tional profit  had  blinded  these  unpatriotic  peo- 
ple to  the  welfare  of  the  troops,  and  they  were 
punished  with  a  fine  and  with  the  loss  of  their 
catering  contract.  That  is  mild  punishment. 


56       TRAINING  FOR  THE  TRENCHES 

Grafters  of  every  kind,  from  those  who  put  bad 
powder  into  shells  or  bad  leather  into  boots,  to 
those  who  risk  an  outbreak  of  sickness  through 
supplying  improper  food,  should  all  be  treated 
the  same  way  that  certain  other  enemies  of  their 
country  are  treated — a  Court-martial  and  a  fir- 
ing party.  No  condemnation  is  too  severe  for 
them.  Officers  will  not  always  find  it  an  easy 
task  to  detect  these  thieves,  but  they  must  be 
very  much  on  their  job  for  this  purpose. 

Then  again  good  food  sometimes  is  allowed 
to  become  bad  food  through  the  careless  han- 
dling by  the  cooks  and  their  assistants.  Covers 
are  left  off  dishes  that  contain  meat,  butter, 
cheese,  -etc.,  and  they  are  ruined  by  dust  or 
flies.  Contaminated  food  is  allowed  to  remain 
in  close  proximity  to  the  food  that  is  to  be  of- 
fered to  the  troops;  cooks  either  use  unclean 
utensils  themselves  or  allow  the  orderlies  from, 
the  various  units  to  return  dirty  utensils  to 
them;  or  they  handle  the  refuse  and  then  the 
food  without  ever  a  thought  to  washing  their 
hands.  One  very  knowing  old  rascal  of  a  cook 
we  had  used  to  have  his  place  in  excellent  con- 
dition at  eleven  in  the  morning  when  the  Or- 
derly Officer  used  to  make  his  rounds,  and  one 
day  when  I  came  upon  him  suddenly  it  was  to 
find  that  he  was  using  one  of  the  bread  bags  as 


cnp    TUCKCLP 
UMPE.R  CORT 


ON 


VOCr 


FIGURE  16: 

Simple  gas  mask  with  flutter  valve  or  check  valve.     Ambulance  dogs 
and  horses  in  the  gas  zone  were  equipped  as  shown. 


HEALTH  AND  OFFICERS  57 

a  receptacle  for  his  change  of  clothes — a  filthy 
collection  of  shirts,  socks,  etc.  He  was  fired, 
and  cursed  me  for  many  a  day  as  he  carried  his 
great  weight  of  avoirdupois  round  the  training 
field  with  a  rifle  over  his  shoulder  like  any  other 
infantryman. 

With  regard  to  water,  while  the  regular  line 
officers  must  also  keep  an  eye  to  its  general 
purity,  it  is  generally  left  to  the  care  of  the 
medical  staff  to  test  it  from  time  to  time  to  make 
certain  of  its  fitness  for  human  use.  "We  ex- 
perienced a  good  deal  of  trouble  in  making  the 
men  keep  their  wash  lines  clean  and  in  making 
them  refrain  from  throwing  soapy,  greasy  wa- 
ter on  the  ground.  It  is  the  easiest  method — 
for  them — but  the  costliest  in  the  long  run,  and 
they  must  be  made  to  throw  it  into  the  proper 
drains. 

Then,  too,  no  camp  will  be  complete  without 
a  thorough  system  of  garbage  disposal.  The 
refuse  should  be  collected  into  tins  that  can  be 
closed  to  keep  away  the  rats,  etc.,  and  then 
taken  at  certain  specified  times  to  the  inciner- 
ator. The  latter  can  easily  be  built  under  any 
circumstances  and  there  can  be  no  reason  for  a 
camp  not  being  well  supplied  in  this  matter. 

Latrines,  also,  must  be  thoroughly  inspected 
by  the  officers  of  every  unit.  They  should  be 


58       TRAINING  FOR  THE  TRENCHES 

established  at  some  distance  from  the  tent  lines, 
and  as  far  removed  as  possible  from  the  kitchen. 
Sand  and  lime  should  be  liberally  supplied.  The 
tasks  of  attending  the  latrines  will  normally 
fall  to  the  sanitary  squad  who  can  be  assisted 
by  those  who  are  convicted  of  the  crime  of  fail- 
ing to  keep  their  lines  clean.  It  is  wonderful 
what  a  wholesome  effect  on  a  lazy  man  has  the 
imposition  of  three  days  latrine  duty!  In  the 
trenches  this  was  one  of  the  few  punishments  at 
our  disposal  for  the  slackers,  for  they  welcomed 
any  punishment  that  would  send  them  away  out 
of  the  firing  line. 

The  same  principles  that  have  been  laid  down 
for  tent  life  will  apply  more  or  less  to  life  in 
billets.  When  the  winter  came  all  the  troops 
in  England  and  Scotland  were  moved  into  bil- 
lets in  towns  where  they  could  be  accommo- 
dated. These  were  usually  manufacturing 
towns  that  had  numerous  small  homes  that 
could  each  accommodate  a  soldier  or  two.  From 
the  point  of  view  of  training  this  is  a  system  far 
from  satisfactory  for  the  men  so  easily  get  out 
of  control.  But  it  is  the  best  system  that  we 
had  at  the  time.  Later  on,  extensive  villages 
of  huts  were  constructed,  and  the  training  pro- 
ceeded normally. 

Sometimes  groups  of  men  were  assembled  in 


HEALTH  AND  OFFICERS  59 

large  vacant  houses.  There  was  no  furniture 
in  them  and  the  troops  had  to  sleep  on  the  floor. 
Cooking  facilities  were  inadequate,  but  worst 
of  all  were  the  toilet  facilities.  These  houses 
had  been  constructed  to  serve  as  the  homes  for 
average  families  of  five  to  ten,  and  when  fifty 
or  sixty  men  were  turned  into  them  the  result 
is  imaginable.  The  same  problems  will  prob- 
ably be  presented  if  ever  American  soldiers  are 
housed  in  this  way,  and  those  who  happen  to  be 
officers  will  have  to  exercise  the  greatest  vigi- 
lance. 

Then  again  we  found  that  there  are  some  men 
who  have  no  idea  of  the  risk  they  run  in  leaving 
food  lying  about  a  house  or  hidden  away.  After 
a  certain  group  had  moved  away  from  Bedford, 
England,  it  was  my  business  to  go  round  the 
houses  they  had  occupied  to  see  if  they  were  fit 
for  occupation  by  the  incoming  troops.  I  found 
to  my  horror  in  one  of  the  houses  that  some  of 
the  men,  instead  of  taking  surplus  meat  out  to 
the  garbage  cans,  had  put  it  under  a  board  in 
the  floor!  It  had  been  there  a  few  days  when 
I  found  it,  and  examination  of  the  other  rooms 
disclosed  the  fact  that  all  sorts  of  things  from 
meat  and  bread  and  tins  to  old  clothes  had 
been  hidden  in  similar  places  by  these  lazy  fel- 
lows. 


60       TRAINING  FOR  THE  TRENCHES 

My  reader  will  soon  realise  that  the  officer  of 
to-day  has  to  keep  his  eyes  constantly  open  to 
preserve  the  best  conditions  for  the  training  of 
his  men.  And  while  I  am  on  this  point  I  wonld 
just  add  this  word.  Not  only  mnst  the  officers 
see  to  it  that  the  food  and  water  are  good 
and  the  camp  kept  clean,  but  he  must  also  have 
the  men's  health  constantly  in  mind  when  he  is 
planning  their  schedule  of  training.  Modera- 
tion is  the  word.  It  is  possible  to  be  too  en- 
thusiastic and  do  the  men  more  harm  than  good 
with  hasty  training.  Exercises  should  be  grad- 
uated. It  must  be  remembered  that  many  of  the 
men  who  will  constitute  civilian  armies  are  not 
used  to  out-of-door  life  and  their  training  must 
be  gentle.  It  is  not  fair  for  an  officer  to  expect 
his  men  to  be  able  to  march  twelve  or  twenty 
miles  on  a  hike  while  he  rides  comfortably  with 
them  on  a  horse !  It  is  a  good  thing  for  him  to 
share  the  fatigue  of  his  men  that  he  may  be  the 
better  able  to  direct  their  training.  I  have 
found  that  a  good  many  of  these  hikes  were 
planned  by  the  higher  officers  who  never  walked 
and  never  understood  when  men  began  to  fall 
out  from  fatigue.  Bests  during  marching 
should  be  fairly  frequent  and  the  men  should 
be  taught  the  advantages  to  be  gained  by  loosen- 
ing their  packs  and  throwing  themselves  down 


HEALTH  AND  OFFICERS  61 

flat  on  the  ground  to  relax  all  their  muscles. 
Singing  and  whistling  should  be  encouraged  on 
the  march,  for  there  is  nothing  like  it  to  make 
a  long  road  seem  short,  but  smoking  should  be 
reserved  for  the  rest  periods. 

The  principle  of  "plenty  of  rests"  should 
also  be  followed  during  physical  exercises  and 
a  man  should  never  be  asked  to  hold  his  arm 
long  in  any  uncomfortable  position.  A  thought- 
ful officer  is  soon  rewarded  by  the  increased 
efficiency  of  his  men.  "Do  unto  others  as  you 
would  have  them  do  unto  you" — will  bring  big 
returns  in  the  army. 


CHAPTER  VI 
COVER  A:ND  TRENCHES 

THIS  war  is  being  fought  out,  not  in  great 
open  battles,  but  in  successive  conflicts 
from  the  security  of  trenches  in  what 
"Papa  Joffre"  has  called  the  "nibbling  pro- 
cess."   It  is  not  simple  work  but  such  as  calls 
for  healthy  bodies,  trained  minds,  and  steady 
nerves.    Quick  action  is  often  necessary.    Inde- 
pendence of  thought,  ingenuity  and  personal 
courage,    combined    with    implicit    obedience, 
make  up  the  ideal  soldier. 

The  training  through  which  a  civilian  must 
go,  then,  will  be  such  as  to  develop  these  quali- 
ties. Every  syllabus  of  training  must  be  drawn 
up  with  this  in  view,  and  all  the  time  the  atten- 
tion of  the  officers  must  be  kept  on  the  fact  that 
the  training  must  be  such  as  to  make  soldiers 
who  will  be  efficient  in  the  kind  of  war  that  is 
being  waged.  Much  that  has  been  written  in  the 
text  books  for  armies  has  had  to  be  discarded 
as  out  of  date.  It  is  no  exaggeration  to  say  that 
the  British  knew  very  little  about  modern  war- 
fare when  we  went  to  France,  in  spite  of  the 

62 


COVER  AND  TRENCHES  63 

fact  that  we  had,  during  this  century,  waged  a 
war  in  South  Africa,  not  to  mention  the  numer- 
ous border  engagements  in  India.  We  did  not 
know  the  tremendously  important  part  that  ar- 
tillery was  to  play ;  we  knew  practically  nothing 
of  the  use  of  bombs ;  we  had  never  made  gas  and 
did  not  know  its  constitution;  and  in  the  work 
of  trench  construction  we  were  in  the  kinder- 
garten class.  Our  enemy  taught  us  many  of 
these  things  and  we  learned  them  slowly.  Now 
we  have  reached  his  standard  and  gone  past  him 
as  the  Tanks  testify.  But  in  pure  frightfulness 
we  can  never  compete  with  him  and  never  in- 
tend to. 

Eight  hours  a  day  of  hard  but  varied  training 
was  our  rule  with  frequent  evening  lectures. 
Conditions  were  arranged  as  much  like  those  on 
active  service  as  possible,  even  to  the  use  of 
"live"  bombs.  Men  are  very  reluctant  at  first 
to  handle  these  explosive  little  instruments  of 
war,  and  they  must  be  given  confidence  in  them- 
selves long  before  they  reach  the  firing  line. 
There  they  are  used  as  freely  as  a  mechanic 
uses  a  machine. 

It  is  said  that  one  general  who  was  training 
his  men  in  the  Midlands  of  England  had  a  diffi- 
culty in  getting  them  to  keep  their  heads  down. 
They  could  not  see  the  necessity  for  it  and  al- 


64       TRAINING  FOR  THE  TRENCHES 

ways  wanted  to  see  all  that  was  going  on.  Now 
in  actual  warfare  the  individual  soldier  is  able 
to  see  very  little  of  what  is  transpiring  round 
about  him,  and  he  has  to  be  content  to  come 
through  with  a  whole  head.  Accordingly  the 
General  served  out  to  a  few  trustworthy  men  a 
number  of  live,  ball  cartridges.  During  the 
manoeuvres  the  men  who  would  put  their  heads 
up  heard  some  of  these  missiles  singing  round 
their  ears,  and  soon  learned  that  it  was  unwise 
to  be  too  curious.  I  am  not  sure  that  I  would 
recommend  this  method — for  were  an  accident 
to  happen  it  would  bring  disgrace  and  dismissal 
to  the  officer  who  had  employed  it — but  it  is 
certainly  an  effective  means. 

One  of  the  first  things  to  be  insisted  upon  in 
training  a  man  is  that  he  learn  the  use  of  COVER. 
He  must  learn  not  only  that  cover  is  necessary, 
but  also  what  constitutes  effective  cover  of  vari- 
ous materials.  The  most  common  form  of  cover 
is  that  afforded  by  piled  up  earth.  A  rifle  bullet 
fired  at  short  range  will  pierce  about  forty 
inches  of  earth  so  that  nothing  less  than 
thirty-six  inches  can  be  considered  as  giving 
protection  from  ordinary  bullets.  Where  sand 
can  be  obtained  ten  inches  less  will  suffice. 
Ordinary  turf  is  not  nearly  so  good  and  noth- 
ing less  than  five  feet  in  thickness  is  sufficient. 


COVER  AND  TRENCHES  65 

Bricks  are  effective.  If  they  are  placed  end 
on  giving  a  thickness  of  nine  inches  this  will 
be  found  sufficient  so  that  a  man  can  feel  fairly 
secure  from  rifle  bullets  standing  behind  an 
ordinary  brick  wall.  Where  wood  is  used  much 
depends  on  its- degree  of  hardness ;  thirty  inches 
for  hardwood  and  forty-five  for  softwood  can 
be  taken  as  affording  complete  protection.  Any 
of  the  harder  substances  such  as  iron  and  steel, 
etc.,  are  preferable,  but  they  can  seldom  be  ob- 
tained. Of  ordinary  iron  plate  three-fourths 
inch  is  necessary  and  less  for  the  different  vari- 
eties of  steel.  Usually  several  of  these  media 
must  be  used.  Boards  can  be  arranged  with 
stones  and  sand  or  litter,  etc.,  between  them. 
The  point  to  be  remembered  is  that  the  required 
thickness  must  be  obtained,  not  at  the  base  of 
the  cover  but  at  the  top,  to  support  which  a 
much  larger  base  will  usually  be  required. 

When  a  man  has  learnt  what  thickness  of  ma- 
terials he  needs  to  have  to  protect  his  life,  it  will 
be  a  good  thing  to  take  him  out  and  let  him  see 
how  far  bullets  are  able  to  pierce  these  media 
by  actually  firing  at  them  from  point  blank 
range.  That  will  give  him  a  respect  for  bullets 
and  impress  the  lesson  on  him. 

But  he  must  also  be  told  that  cover  that  pro- 
tects is  only  half  what  is  required.  It  must  be 


66       TRAINING  FOR  THE  TRENCHES 

such  as  to  allow  him  to  become  offensive  while 
giving  him  defence.  The  problem  is  a  simple 
one  in  actual  trenches,  where  he  has  no  alterna- 
tive but  to  build  them  continuously  and  then 
fire  over  the  top  or  through  loop-holes  of  steel. 
But  when  more  open  fighting  develops  he  must 
learn  that  his  business  is  not  only  to  get  reason- 
able protection  for  his  own  body  but  to  be  able 
to  bring  his  rifle  to  bear  on  the  enemy.  This 
necessitates  a  certain  amount  of  exposure. 
Certain  devices  have  been  developed  during  this 
war  to  allow  a  man  to  fire  his  rifle  from  beneath 
the  parapet  of  the  trench  by  means  of  specially 
adapted  periscopes.  These  are  of  great  use  for 
snipers  but  cannot  be  used  by  all  the  men. 

In  open  fighting  men  often  make  the  mistake 
of  seeking  cover  in  what  is  obviously  the  most 
protected  place  from  rifle  bullets,  but  equally 
obvious  to  those  of  experience  as  the  most  likely 
place  for  the  enemy  to  choose  as  marks  for-  his 
artillery.  Orchards,  woods,  houses,  etc.,  come 
within  this  category,  and  it  is  only  experience 
that  will  teach  a  man  what  places  to  choose  and 
what  places  to  avoid.  Wherever  the  enemy  can 
view  the  approaches  to  these  shelters,  either  by 
direct  vision  from  their  positions  or  by  means 
of  aeroplanes  or  observation  balloons,  they  be- 
come dangerous  as  cover. 


COVER  AND  TRENCHES  67 

Modern  trenches  are  intended  to  give  cover 
from  fire  and  from  view.  They  are  seldom 
roofed  over,  so  that,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  they 
can  be  seen  from  the  air,  but  it  is  not  by  any 
means  an  easy  task  either  for  an  aeroplane  to 
drop  bombs  tEere  (a  ditch  three  feet  wide)  nor 
yet  for  the  artillery  to  hit  them.  But  we  seldom 
are  able  to  inherit  trenches — they  usually  have 
to  be  dug  under  cover  of  darkness  while  the 
enemy  is  sniping.  For  this  purpose  each  man 
in  the  British  army  carries  a  small  entrenching 
tool  on  his  back,  as  well  as  two  sandbags. 
Every  man  is  trained  in  the  use  of  this  valuable 
little  tool,  and  soon  learns  never  to  be  without 
it.  When,  during  an  advance,  he  needs  to  pro- 
vide cover  for  himself,  he  throws  himself  down 
on  the  ground  placing  his  rifle  at  his  left  side, 
and  begins  to  dig  away  the  earth  at  his  right 
side,  throwing  the  loose  earth  up  in  front  of 
him.  Just  as  soon  as  he  can  he  takes  the  sand- 
bags from  his  back  and  fills  them,  placing  them 
in  front  of  him.  Under  this  imperfect  cover  he 
proceeds  to  deepen  the  hole  till  he  can  roll  his 
body  into  it.  This  miniature  trench  should  be 
two  feet  wide  and  three  feet  long.  Then  if  time 
permits  he  should  add  small  comforts  such  as  a 
recess  for  his  feet,  drainage  for  water,  etc.  He 
will  find  that  he  needs  to  dig  down  to  about  two 


68       TRAINING  FOR  THE  TRENCHES 

feet,  all  the  time  throwing  the  earth  out  in 
front  and  occasionally  pushing  it  out  a  little  so 
as  to  make  it  of  sufficient  width,  for,  of  course, 
he  will  be  seeking  to  get  a  parapet  of  about  a 
yard  in  thickness  at  the  top.  If  he  has  an  op- 
portunity of  firing  he  should  do  so,  not  over  the 
top  of  his  cover  but  round  the  right  side  of  it. 
To  fire  over  it  is  to  ask  for  trouble.  The  body 
and  legs  should  be  placed  in  such  a  position  that 
they  are  covered  as  much  as  possible  by  the 
earth  thrown  up  in  front. 

If  an  advance  has  to  be  made  from  this  posi- 
tion, the  small  trench  will  have  served  its  pur- 
pose in  giving  temporary  shelter.  But  there 
are  times  when  troops  have  to  consolidate  posi- 
tions won  in  this  way,  and  on  the  site  of  these 
primitive  trenches,  more  elaborate  ones  have  to 
be  made.  At  the  battle  of  Neuve  Chapelle  the 
troops  took  up  a  certain  line,  dug  themselves 
in  in  a  rough  way,  and  then  during  the  night 
they  set  to  work  to  construct  the  very  trenches 
that  still  shelter  them  to  this  day.  But  it  was 
due  to  the  entrenching  tools  and  the  few  sand 
bags  that  they  were  able  to  hold  the  line  during 
the  hours  of  daylight,  and  when  the  next  morn- 
ing dawned  they  had  a  fairly  adequate  protec- 
tion. 

While  the  question  of  cover  is  very  important, 


COVER  AND  TRENCHES  69 

I  do  not  wish  to  convey  the  impression  that  men 
should  have  this  subject  always  in  their  minds. 
To  use  a  rock  or  a  tree  or  a  mound  of  earth  as  a 
temporary  shelter  is  one  thing;  but  to  continue 
to  hide  behind  it  at  the  time  an  advance  is 
needed,  is  another.  The  man  who  hesitates  to 
go  forward  when  he  has  recovered  his  wind,  but 
who  takes  care  of  his  precious  skin  by  remain- 
ing under  cover,  is  worse  than  useless.  The  ob- 
ject of  all  troops  must  be  to  get  into  touch  with 
the  enemy  and  drive  him  out  with  the  bayonet. 
Cover  will  help  to  keep  a  man  alive  for  a  little 
while  to  be  able  to  do  that  work. 

When  through  adverse  circumstances — usu- 
ally the  presence  of  the  enemy  in  superior  force 
— an  army  has  to  go  to  ground,  it  sets  to  work 
in  dead  earnest  to  build  its  trenches.  We  have 
learned  that  the  best  fortifications  that  can  be 
got  are  those  that  are  constructed  in  the  earth. 
The  guns  of  Verdun  have  practically  never  been 
in  operation — indeed  at  the  present  time  there 
are  no  guns  in  the  old  forts — and  the  reason  for 
this  is  that  earth  works  of  such  strength  were 
thrown  up  at  a  distance  from  the  forts  that  the 
Germans  were  never  able  to  get  their  heavy 
guns  to  bear  on  them.  The  forts  of  Liege,  and 
Namur,  and  Antwerp  all  fell  before  the  great 
howitzers,  but  the  earth  works  of  Verdun  were 


70       TRAINING  FOR  THE  TRENCHES 

too  much,  for  them.  It  is  doubtful  if  large  forts 
will  ever  again  be  used  in  inland  places,  for  the 
earthworks  have  proved  their  great  superiority. 
Trenches  are  laid  out  and  dug  as  shown  in  the 
accompanying  diagram  [Figure  4] .  They  do  not 
consist  of  one  long  straight  line,  but  what  may  be 
described  as  a  succession  of  little  rooms,  about 
twenty  feet  long,  seven  feet  deep  and  three  feet 
broad.  They  are  seldom  roofed  over.  Each 
little  room  is  connected  to  the  ones  on  either 
side  by  a  trench  that  runs  behind  the  four-feet- 
square  traverse  that  is  of  solid  earth  and 
which  serves  the  purpose  of  localising  the  effect 
of  shells,  bombs,  etc.  If  the  trenches  were  in 
one  straight  line,  a  shell  that  fell  there  would 
be  liable  to  injure  a  great  many  men ;  whereas 
under  the  present  system  the  traverse  acts  as 
a  buffer  and  limits  the  radius  of  its  explosive 
force.  The  trench  itself  is  dug  about  three  feet 
deep,  care  being  taken  to  lift  off  the  top  layer 
of  grass  and  keep  it  aside  to  place  over  the 
front  of  the  earth  on  completion  of  the  trenches, 
to  render  them  less  visible.  As  the  earth  is 
lifted  out  it  is  thrown  to  the  front  and  rear,  and 
some  of  it  put  into  sandbags  which  are  then 
laid  like  stones  as  shown.  The  front  part  of  the 
trench  is  then  called  the  parapet  and  the  rear 
part  the  parados.  Both  must  be  made  strong, 


COVER  AND  TRENCHES  71 

the  parapet  for  reasons  already  given,  and  the 
parados  in  order  to  protect  the  men  from  the 
force  of  shells  that  fall  just  behind  the  trenches. 
About  a  foot  from  the  ground  there  is  placed  a 
board  that  is  called  the  " firing  step,"  on  which 
the  men  stantl  when  they  are  about  to  fire.  I 
have  said  that  there  is  seldom  any  roof  over  the 
trenches.  It  is  difficult  to  cover  in  the  trenches 
because  of  the  limited  supply  of  materials. 
Then  again  it  is  questionable  if  roofing  pays; 
for,  admitting  that  they  may  be  able  to  keep 
out  small  bombs  and  rifle  bullets,  they  can  never 
hope  to  be  able  to  keep  out  shells.  The  Ger- 
mans used  to  roof  in  a  great  deal — but  then 
they  were  there  to  wage  a  defensive  war  and  did 
not  propose  to  move  for  a  good  while. 

In  some  ground  the  earth  will  "hold  itself 
up  "  at  the  sides  of  the  trenches,  in  other  ground 
it  will  have  to  be  revetted.  This  is  done  with 
chicken  wire,  or  with  willows  or  old  staves 
where  they  can  be  had.  It  is  important  to  have 
the  sides  firm,  or  else  in  wet  weather  especially, 
they  will  prove  a  nuisance  to  the  occupants  of 
the  trenches. 

Some  kind  of  floor  should  be  provided  for  the 
trenches.  The  simplest  and  best  are  made  in 
the  following  way :  Take  two  seven-inch  boards 
about  ten  feet  in  length,  nail  them  together  to 


72      TRAINING  FOR  THE  TRENCHES 

make  a  f ourteen-inch  plank,  and  then  cover  the 
whole  with  fairly  fine  chicken  wire.  Place  these 
boards  on  the  ground  with  the  side  on  which 
the  wires  are  joined  downwards.  They  keep 
the  feet  from  slipping,  are  easily  cleaned  by 
being  upended  when  they  are  dry,  and  allow  the 
space  under  them  to  be  reached  easily  to  pick 
up  scraps  of  food,  etc.  There  is  nothing  more 
heart  breaking  than  having  to  pursue  your 
weary  course  for  miles,  sometimes,  up  trenches 
with  slippery  sides  and  sloping,  wet,  treacher- 
ous bottoms. 

In  each  trench  there  must  be  dugouts  for  the 
men  to  sleep  in.  The  first  ones  that  are  made 
will  be  very  primitive,  and  will  be  very  much 
like  a  fireplace  in  a  room — simply  excavations  in 
the  back  wall  of  the  trench  almost  on  a  level  with 
the  bottom  of  it.  At  first  they  used  to  be  dug 
in  the  front  of  the  trench,  but  this  practice  was 
discontinued  as  it  was  found  to  weaken  the 
power  of  resistance  of  the  very  important  para- 
pet. In  the  course  of  time  more  labour  can  be 
expended  upon  the  dugouts,  and  it  will  be  found 
advisable  to  construct  them  of  uniform  size,  six 
feet  long  by  four  feet  wide  by  four  feet  high. 
By  having  them  uniform  we  give  the  engineers 
a  chance  to  make  frames  that  can  be  used  to 
support  the  roof  and  the  sides  and  bring  them 


COVER  AND  TRENCHES  73 

well  from  the  rear  to  construct  tlie  dugouts. 
These  dimensions  do  not  make  a  very  com- 
modious home  for  four  men,  but  never  more 
than  three  of  a  section  (of  four)  are  off  duty 
at  the  same  time,  and  besides  there  is  consider- 
able danger  inTiaving  large  dugouts,  as  they 
present  a  correspondingly  larger  target  for  the 
guns.  A  direct  hit  on  a  large  dugout  will  often 
bring  the  whole  thing  crashing  about  the  ears  of 
the  inhabitants.  My  own  adjutant  and  one  of 
my  brother  officers  were  killed  by  falling  beams 
in  large  dugouts.  The  entrance  to  the  dugouts 
must  be  kept  as  small  as  possible  so  as  to  pro- 
tect the  occupants  from  shells  that  fall  just 
outside. 

The  Germans  used  to  follow  the  custom  of 
digging  many  of  their  "funk  holes,''  as  they 
were  called,  many  feet  underground.  Some- 
times they  went  down  twenty  and  even  thirty 
feet.  The  idea  of  this  was  that  they  could  re- 
treat into  these  secure  places  during  a  bombard- 
ment and  then  emerge  with  their  machine  guns 
as  soon  as  the  attacking  infantry  had  started  to 
approach  over  "No  Man's  Land."  We  never 
followed  that  custom,  for  while  it  will  work  at 
times,  yet  the  attacking  infantry  may  be  upon 
you  before  you  are  aware  of  it  and  have  you  at 
their  mercy  with  bayonets  and  bombs  from  the 


74       TRAINING  FOR  THE  TRENCHES 

parapet.    This   the    Germans   have   learnt   to 
their  cost  many  times  on  the  Somme. 

Many  efforts  have  been  made  to  construct 
dugouts,  reasonably  near  the  surface,  that 
would  be  shell  proof.  This  is  a  most  difficult 
matter.  It  is  easy  enough  to  make  them  shrap- 
nel-proof. A  layer  of  galvanised  iron  on  the 
roof  covered  with  a  foot  of  loose  earth  will  ac- 
complish this  for  the  velocity  of  shrapnel  is  not 
great.  But  with  high  explosive  shells  it  is  dif- 
ferent. It  was  seen  at  Liege  and  Namur  what 
terrific  effects  high  explosive  shells  fired  from 
howitzers  could  have  even  on  re-enforced  con- 
crete. I  am  told  that  at  Port  Arthur,  a  Eussian 
General  was  killed  in  a  shelter  that  was  covered 
with  over  twelve  feet  of  concrete.  The  closest 
we  can  approach  to  a  shell-proof  dugout  on  the 
field  is  as  follows:  Dig  an  approach  trench 
about  ten  feet  deep,  leading  into  a  hole  of  this 
depth,  by  any  dimensions  you  may  choose — say 
six  feet  square.  Put  in  supports  for  the  roof 
that  shall  be  four  feet  from  the  floor.  Roof  in 
with  steel  rails,  such  as  are  used  on  railroads, 
then  cover  them  with  two  or  three  layers  of 
bricks  that  have  been  broken  into  small  pieces. 
Leave  a  five-foot  air  space  and  then  place  an 
exactly  similar  roof  above  and  cover  the  whole 
with  earth.  Small  shells  will  be  stopped  at  the 


COVER  AND  TRENCHES  75 

first  set  of  rails,  while  large  ones  may  possibly 
pierce  them.  But  the  effect  of  the  explosion 
will  mostly  be  taken  Tip  in  the  airchamber  and 
the  dugout  itself  protected.  The  reader  will 
readily  perceive  the  difficulty  of  constructing 
such  dugout  oiFthe  field  and  they  can  certainly 
not  be  provided  for  the  accommodation  of  the 
common  soldier  however  precious  his  life 
may  be. 

As  the  days  go  by,  every  effort  must  be  made 
to  improve  the  trenches.  This  can  be  done  in 
many  ways,  some  of  which  will  be  obvious.  The 
front  line  is,  of  course,  the  most  important  one, 
and  the  greatest  amount  of  work  has  to  be  done 
there.  But  support  and  reserve  lines  as  well 
must  be  constructed  and  many  communicating 
trenches.  Support  lines  were  usually  dug  at  a 
distance  of  thirty  to  eighty  yards  from  the  fir- 
ing line.  In  them  we  kept  a  few  men  to  be  used 
in  case  of  emergency.  This  line  was  an  exact 
duplicate  of  the  front  line  and  was  intended  to 
be  used  in  case  we  were  pushed  back.  The  re- 
serve line  was  about  five  to  eight  hundred  yards 
back  from  the  front  line  and  was  not  brought  to 
any  very  great  degree  of  completion.  Inter- 
spersed between  these  three  lines  were  many 
redoubts,  or  especially  strong  points  containing 
machine  guns,  etc.,  whose  defenders  were  ex- 


76       TRAINING  FOR  THE  TRENCHES 

pected  to  hold  on  to  the  very  last  and  take  ad- 
vantage of  their  more  secure  position  to  make 
the  attacker  pay  dearly  for  his  advance.  All 
these  lines  had  to  be  linked  up  by  communicat- 
ing trenches,  which  started  about  a  mile  in  the 
rear  of  the  front  line  and  went  up  in  zigzag 
lines  to  the  latter  position,  crossing  the  other 
trenches  on  their  way.  These  communicating 
trenches  are  used  for  the  purpose  of  bringing 
up  troops  and  supplies,  etc.,  and  for  taking  to 
the  rear  the  men  that  have  been  wounded.  It  is 
usually  arranged  to  have  some  of  these  trenches 
' '  Up  "  and  some  of  them ' '  Down ' '  roads.  Each 
line  of  trenches  (except  of  course  the  "com- 
municating") contain  dugouts  for  the  use  of 
the  troops  that  hold  them.  The  distance  be- 
tween the  communicating  trenches  varies  from 
twenty-five  yards  to  three  or  four  hundred  ac- 
cording to  the  state  of  perfection  of  the  trench 
system. 

For  special  weapons  such  as  machine  guns 
and  bomb  guns,  special  shelters  have  to  be 
made.  Extra  strong  parapets  are  provided  as 
well  as  head  cover  of  railroad  ties,  and  every 
effort  is  made  to  keep  the  exact  position  of  the 
machine  guns  secret  from  the  enemy.  We  soon 
learnt  that  he  was  very  anxious  to  find  our  ma- 


COVER  AND  TRENCHES  77 

chine  guns  and  would  shell  us  liberally  in  the 
hope  of  being  able  to  locate  them. 

Care  must  be  given  to  the  question  of  drain- 
age. Small  ditches  should  be  dug  at  intervals 
of  a  few  yards  to  lead  the  water  to  pits  in  the 
rear.  In  Flanders,  where  we  were  very  near 
river  level,  we  installed  hand  and  power  pumps 
to  keep  the  water  from  taking  possession  of 
the  trenches.  Even  then,  on  rainy  days  we 
sometimes  were  in  water  up  to  our  waists. 

Great  care  must  also  be  taken  in  the  construc- 
tion of  latrines.  The  method  that  was  followed 
was  to  dig  a  short  "  blind  alley "  trench  at  right 
angles  to  one  of  the  communicating  trenches, 
and  at  a  distance  of  twelve  or  fifteen  yards  from 
the  front  line.  Starting  from  the  end  of  this 
blind  alley,  the  trench  was  gradually  filled  in 
with  earth  as  it  was  used.  In  other  cases  bis- 
cuit tins  were  used  as  receptacles  and  the  ordi- 
nary sanitary  squads  emptied  them  at  specified 
times  into  a  fairly  deep  pit.  These  latrines 
should  be  well  protected  with  sandbags  to  keep 
the  enemy  from  finding  them  and  training  a  ma- 
chine gun  on  them,  in  the  knowledge  that  they 
were  very  likely  to  get  some  of  the  men  who 
used  them  during  the  day. 

This,  I  believe,  gives  the  principal  points  in 
the  construction  of  the  trenches.  Men  should 


78      TRAINING  FOR  THE  TRENCHES 

be  taught  to  dig  them  in  broad  daylight  at  first 
and  then  when  they  have  learnt  the  knack,  they 
should  be  set  to  dig  them  at  night.  From  time 
to  time  during  their  training  they  should  be 
made  to  return — preferably  to  the  same  sections 
of  the  trenches — to  improve  them  and  maintain 
them.  An  excellent  scheme  is  to  arrange  com- 
petitions among  the  men  to  spur  them  on  to  in- 
vent ingenious  devices  for  protecting  them- 
selves and  their  fellows  during  their  occupation 
of  them.  At  certain  times  they  should  also  be 
made  to  spend  a  night  and  then  several  nights 
there,  going  through  the  regular  routine  of  sen- 
try duty,  stand  to  arms,  etc.,  just  as  they  will 
have  to  do  in  real  warfare.  Another  scheme  is 
to  choose  opposing  sides  with  trenches  within 
easy  reach,  say,  twenty-five  yards  apart.  Ar- 
range a  three-day  tour  of  the  trenches,  and  let 
each  side  attempt  to  surprise  the  other.  Um- 
pires can  be  stationed  in  No  Man's  Land  to 
decide  as  to  the  relative  merits  of  the  two  sides. 
At  certain  times,  additional  interest  can  be 
given  to  the  conflict  by  some  harmless  missiles 
such  as  sand  bags  (without  the  sand!)  rolled  up 
and  made  into  a  ball  the  size  of  a  base  ball  with 
string.  These  will  also  give  excellent  practice 
in  bomb  throwing. 


FIGURE  17: 

British  soldier  fully  equipped  with  pack,  entrenching  tool,  sandbags 
and  steel  helmet. 


COVER  AND  TRENCHES  79 

The  rules  of  the  trenches  can  be  summed  up 
in  a  few  words:  "Keep  your  spirits  up  and 
your  head  down." 


CHAPTER  yn 

PEOTECTION  OP  TKENCHES 

fT^HEBE  are  two  things  to  be  done  after  the 
trenches  have  been  dug — one  is  to  keep 
them  in  order,  and  the  other  is  to  provide 
outside  protection  for  them.  The  elements 
themselves  are  enough  to  play  havoc  with  the 
sand  bags  and  the  walls  of  trenches,  but  if  you 
add  to  this  the  fact  that  they  will  immediately 
become  the  marks  for  the  enemy  gunners  you 
will  see  that  the  cost  of  upkeep  is  liable  to  be 
high. 

During  the  first  year  of  the  war  the  Germans 
were  supplied  with  an  amount  of  shells  that 
enabled  them  to  do  what  they  pleased  with  our 
trenches  without  our  being  able  to  reply.  In- 
deed, for  many  months,  as  is  now  well  known,  we 
were  on  an  allowance  of  six  shells  per  battery 
per  day,  or  about  one  shell  per  gun  per  day! 
Gunners  will  readily  appreciate  the  uselessness 
of  a  stock  of  this  kind.  The  result  of  this  dis- 
crepancy in  the  number  of  shells  was  that  the 
enemy  could  shell  us  with  impunity.  He  used 

80 


PROTECTION  OF  TRENCHES  81 

to  set  to  work  to  break  down  our  parapets  early 
in  the  morning,  and  then,  knowing  that  we 
should  have  to  repair  them  during  the  night, 
would  train  machine  guns  on  the  breeches  that 
had  been  made.  It  is  a  very  disheartening 
business  to  have  the  parapets  that  you  have 
laboured  so  hard  to  construct,  knocked  down  in 
a  few  minutes.  There  would  be  some  consola- 
tion in  being  able  to  serve  him  the  same  way, 
but  that  was  denied  us  at  that  time.  Indeed, 
one  of  the  best  ways  to  preserve  your  trenches 
is  to  let  him  know  by  experience  that  every  time 
he  breaks  them  down,  you  will  do  the  same  thing 
to  him, 

Every  night  there  will  be  something  to  do  in 
this  connection.  No  effort  must  be  spared  to 
get  the  trenches  into  first-class  condition  and 
keep  them  thus.  It  is  very  annoying  to  relieve 
a  battalion  that  has  lain  down  on  their  job  dur- 
ing their  tour  of  duty  in  the  line,  and  to  find 
that  you  have  a  great  deal  of  work  to  do — work 
that  could  have  been  avoided  if  they  had  taken 
reasonable  care  of  the  work  that  had  already 
been  accomplished  when  they  took  over  the 
trenches. 

As  to  the  outside  protection  for  the  trenches, 
that  consists  for  the  most  part  of  barbed  wire. 
Sir  Ian  Hamilton,  in  his  report  on  the  Darda- 


82       TRAINING  FOR  THE  TRENCHES 

nelles  Expedition,  paid  a  tribute  to  the  effec- 
tiveness of  the  Turkish  barbed  wire.  It  was  the 
means  of  stopping  a  British  advance  more  than 
once  on  the  Peninsula,  just  as  it  was  in  France. 
At  the  battle  of  Aubers  Ridge,  fought  on  May 
9,  1915,  we  suffered  most  heavily  from  the  fact 
that  the  wires  had  not  been  cut,  and  therefore 
we  were  unable  to  make  progress.  We  had  to 
retreat,  leaving  a  number  of  our  dead  and 
wounded  before  the  enemy  lines.  It  would  be 
difficult  to  exaggerate  the  part  that  barbed 
wires  have  played  in  this  war.  Wherever  they 
are  set  up  it  means  that  a  thorough  bombard- 
ment must  be  made  before  an  advance  can  be 
risked. 

The  erection  of  these  entanglements  is  really 
the  work  of  Engineers,  but  so  extensive  is  the 
task  that  infantrymen  have  to  be  called  in  to 
do  the  pick  and  shovel  work  while  the  engineers 
do  the  directing.  Stakes  are  driven  deep  into 
the  ground,  and  round  them  the  wire  is  twisted 
as  it  is  taken  from  stake  to  stake.  Some  wires 
are  laid  on  a  level  with  the  ground,  some  a  few 
inches  above  it,  then  all  the  way  up  to  ten  or 
fifteen  feet  into  the  air,  making  a  regular  net- 
work. We  tried  to  have  our  wires  extending 
over  a  width  of  ground  of  at  least  twenty  feet. 

But  not  only  are  barbed  wires  used,  but  also 


PROTECTION  OF  TRENCHES  83 

electrically  charged  wires  in  some  cases,  though 
between  the  lines  they  will  seldom  be  of  much 
use  for  a  single  shell  may  short  circuit  the 
system  and  it  be  rendered  harmless.  An  ef- 
fective method  was  that  of  placing  trip  wires 
near  the  ground,  and  then  a  little  beyond  them 
bayonets  with  the  sharp  points  uppermost,  or 
pointed  sticks,  so  that  when  the  man  tripped 
over  the  wire  he  would  fall  and  impale  himself 
on  the  spikes.  Sometimes  bombs  were  attached 
to  the  wires  in  places  where  it  was  thought 
likely  that  the  enemy  would  attempt  to  cut  them 
or  come  through  them. 

As  these  entanglements  have  to  be  erected 
during  the  night  and  under  the  fire  of  the  enemy 
it  will  be  seen  that  it  becomes  exceedingly  dan- 
gerous work.  But  it  has  to  be  done,  and  the 
risk  must  be  taken  for  the  sake  of  the  addi- 
tional security  it  will  give  to  the  trenches.  It 
has  been  suggested  that  this  is  work  to  which 
the  conscientious  objectors  in  England — the 
Pacifists  here — might  be  put.  It  is  necessary 
work  for  the  preservation  of  life,  and  is  not 
specifically  military.  It  is  labourer's  work. 
There  is  no  chance  of  fighting  out  there  nor  of 
taking  human  life.  Then  it  offers  an  excellent 
opportunity  of  winning  the  martyr's  crown  be- 
cause some  one  is  sure  to  turn  a  machine  gun 


84      TRAINING  FOR  THE  TRENCHES 

on  you  if  you  remain  out  there  long  enough. 
All  of  these  points  should  appeal  to  Pacifists. 
But  the  greatest  reason  from  our  point  of  view 
is  that  it  would  save  the  lives  of  valuable  men ! 

The  men  in  the  trenches  are  further  protected 
by  men  whose  business  it  is  to  go  out  into  No 
Man's  Land  and  remain  there  hours  at  a  time, 
lying  in  some  kind  of  hole,  and  listening  to  be 
able  to  detect  the  presence  of  the  enemy. 
Should  the  enemy  make  his  appearance  in  small 
parties,  these  listening  posts  can  usually  take 
care  of  them,  but  when  they  are  in  large  parties, 
the  listening  post  men  return  to  the  trenches 
and  give  warning.  The  best  nerves  are  needed 
by  the  men  who  go  out  into  the  open  to  do  this 
work,  and  sooner  or  later  every  one  has  to  take 
a  turn  at  it.  These  listening  posts  are  some- 
times entirely  disconnected  from  the  trenches, 
and  out  beyond  their  own  barbed  wire,  through 
which  the  men  have  to  make  a  passage  for  the 
time  being,  and  of  course  keep  it  secret.  But 
sometimes  they  are  connected  with  the  fire 
trench  by  a  shallow  trench  or  sap  which  is  dug 
out  into  the  neutral  territory  whenever  circum- 
stances are  favourable. 

When  the  troops  landed  at  Suvla  Bay,  on  the 
Peninsula,  they  found  several  excellent  water 
holes  that  were  most  inviting  to  parched  and 


PROTECTION  OF  TRENCHES  85 

thirsty  men.  A  rush  was  made  for  them,  when 
suddenly  a  terrific  explosion  was  heard,  and 
dozens  of  men  fell  flat  on  the  ground,  some  dead, 
some  wounded.  The  Turks  had  taken  the  pre- 
caution to  place  land  mines  round  these  wells, 
and  as  soon  as  they  were  stepped  upon,  the 
mines  went  off.  This  is  a  genuine  ruse  of  war 
and  was  used  also  between  the  lines.  The  Turks 
never  resorted  to  the  treachery  that  General 
Botha  had  to  overcome  in  German  East  Africa 
where  he  found  the  wells,  not  mined,  but  poi- 
soned. A  recent  report  from  France  tells  us 
that  in  the  present  retreat  the  Germans  are  em- 
ploying the  same  dastardly  tactics.  It  is  one 
thing  to  protect  your  trenches  or  your  line  of 
retreat;  it  is  quite  another  to  take  the  lives  of 
men  in  this  barbarous  way. 

Trenches  dug  in  the  foregoing  manner  and 
protected  by  barbed  wire  will  give  the  infantry- 
man a  chance  to  live.  But  he  will  increase  or 
decrease  the  probability  of  coming  out  alive  ac- 
cording as  he  is  careful  or  careless  during  the 
time  he  is  there.  Nothing,  of  course,  can  save 
the  men  if  the  enemy  is  determined  to  thor- 
oughly shell  the  line,  and  the  orders  are  to  hold 
it.  The  sanest  thing  when  a  bombardment  be- 
gins is  to  withdraw  to  the  next  safe  line.  But 
the  enemy  will  sometimes  be  content  to  allow 


86       TRAINING  FOR  THE  TRENCHES 

men  to  remain  in  their  trenches  for  a  while 
without  shelling  them  provided  they  do  not  wil- 
fully provoke  him.  A  column  of  smoke  arising 
from  the  trenches  where  the  men  were  cooking 
was  usually  considered  by  the  enemy  as  provo- 
cation, and  over  the  shells  would  come.  This 
brings  us  to  the  point  that  I  wish  to  make  re- 
garding fires.  The  men  must  eat  during  their 
tour  of  duty,  and  they  must  have  hot  food,  con- 
sequently fires  of  some  kind  are  needed.  But 
they  should  be  made  of  very  small  pieces  of 
wood  cut  up  with  a  pocket  knife  so  small  that 
they  will  not  give  off  any  smoke.  By  following 
this  method  a  safe  and  very  hot  fire  can  be 
made.  At  times  we  were  supplied  with  small 
quantities  of  charcoal  which  was  very  accept- 
able. As  a  matter  of  fact,  more  liberties  in  this 
connection  can  usually  be  taken  in  the  firing 
trench  than  in  the  support  or  reserve  trenches. 
The  enemy  knows  perfectly  well  men  are  in  the 
firing  trench.  He  sees  from  the  rifle  fire  that 
that  is  manned,  but  it  is  a  good  thing  to  keep 
him  guessing  about  the  other  trenches. 

For  the  same  reason  there  should  never  be 
any  unnecessary  noise  in  the  trenches.  It  pro- 
vokes the  enemy  to  throw  bombs  and  other  un- 
welcome missiles. 

I  have  indicated  that  the  present  form  of 


PROTECTION  OF  TRENCHES  87 

trenches,  being  in  a  continuous  line,  makes  it 
necessary  either  to  construct  loopholes  or  to 
look  over  the  top  of  the  parapet  in  order  to  fire. 
I  have  indicated  too  that  there  are  several  forms 
of  rifles  that  can  be  fired  through  periscopes, 
but  these  must*  as  yet  be  considered  special  and 
are  not  for  the  ordinary  man  to  use.  No  doubt 
such  a  rifle  will  be  invented  and  generally  used 
in  the  future.  But  in  this  war  we  soon  learned 
that  it  was  "  unhealthy "  to  put  our  heads  above 
the  parapet  any  more  frequently  than  we  had 
to.  Therefore,  in  order  to  see  what  the  enemy 
was  about,  and  to  wait  for  sniping  opportuni- 
ties we  used  periscopes.  Some  of  those  that 
were  brought  to  France  were  huge  cumbersome 
boxes  that  made  a  fine  mark  for  the  enemy's 
sharpshooters.  But  the  kind  that  was  most 
generally  used  after  the  first  six  months  of  the 
war  was  that  which  consisted  of  a  stick  with  two 
slanting  grooves  in  it,  one  near  each  end,  into 
which  grooves  small  mirrors  could  be  fitted. 
We  found  them  quite  effective,  and  should  an 
accident  happen  and  a  mirror  be  broken  they 
were  easily  replaced  from  the  store  we  carried 
with  us  for  that  purpose.  Not  having  a  box  of 
any  kind  they  were  very  difficult  to  see  from  the 
enemy  lines. 

Certain  gunners  who  used  to  come  to  the 


88      TRAINING  FOR  THE  TRENCHES 

trenches  as  Forward  Observing  Officers  were 
equipped  with  a  splendid  periscope  that  had 
beautiful  lenses  in  it.  But  it  was  very  costly 
and  could  not  easily  be  repaired  if  once  dam- 
aged. 

To  make  the  image  in  the  periscope  clearer, 
binoculars  can  be  applied  to  the  lower  glass  at 
the  proper  angle,  and  almost  as  clear  a  view 
obtained  as  by  looking  over  the  parapet.  One 
disadvantage  of  the  periscope  is  that  it  makes 
the  distance  seem  greater  than  it  really  is,  and 
many  a  man  receives  a  shock  when  he  places 
his  head  above  the  parapet  after  looking 
through  a  periscope  for  a  while,  to  see  how  close 
the  enemy  trenches  are. 

Trenches  are  exposed  to  attack  not  only  from 
the  surface  but  also  from  the  air  and  from  be- 
neath the  surface  of  the  ground.  Aeroplanes 
come  over  and  drop  steel  darts  or  bombs,  and 
only  very  strong  head  cover  can  give  protection 
against  them.  But  it  is  very  hard  to  hit  a 
trench  from  the  air  with  a  missile  of  this  kind, 
and  the  danger  to  the  men  in  the  trenches  is  not 
very  great.  By  far  the  greater  danger  comes 
from  mining.  Men  must  be  on  the  watch  all 
the  time  to  detect  these  operations  of  the  enemy 
and  to  forestall  them  where  possible.  Special 
instruments  like  giant  stethoscopes  have  been 


PROTECTION  OF  TRENCHES  89 

invented  and  men  are  told  off  to  hold  them  to 
the  ground  to  detect  the  sounds  of  digging. 
But,  while  these  instruments  are  of  use,  the  best 
means  is  a  well  trained  ear.  If  the  enemy  is  dis- 
covered mining  towards  your  position,  the  only 
thing  to  do  is  4o  countermine  him  and  try  and 
blow  him  up  before  he  is  ready  to  touch  off  the 
fuse  that  is  intended  for  your  destruction.  It  is 
not  an  easy  matter  to  decide  just  where  the 
countermine  should  be  sunk  or  how  far  to  go. 
Many  combats  have  been  fought  with  pick  and 
shovel  in  the  bowels  of  the  earth  in  cases  where 
one  side  or  the  other  has  broken  through  the 
gallery.  But  any  risk  must  be  taken  rather 
than  let  the  enemy  enjoy  uninterrupted  his 
work  of  mining  you. 


CHAPTER  VHI 

ABTILLERY   FIRE 

IT  may  be  desirable  to  indicate  the  various 
kinds  of  shell  fire  to  which  trench  men  are 
exposed.  (I  pass  over  rifle  fire  which  is 
harmless  so  long  as  men  keep  their  heads  down 
and  avoid  corners  from  which  they  can  be  enfi- 
laded.) No  amount  of  caution  will  save  a  man 
from  shells  if  they  happen  to  be  falling  in  his 
neighbourhood.  The  most  frequent  visitor  of 
the  shell  variety  is  of  course  the  shell  from  the 
field  gun.  The  British  use  an  18-pounder,  the 
French  a  75  millimetre,  and  the  Germans  a  77 
millimetre — all  shells  of  about  the  same  calibre 
(3  inches).  Of  these  the  best  gun  is  undoubt- 
edly the  French,  which  is  a  perfectly  marvellous 
piece  of  mechanism.  But  all  of  them  are  deadly 
in  their  effects.  They  may  fire  either  shrapnel 
or  high  explosive — always  spoken  of  in  the 
army  as  H.  E.  In  the  former  case,  the  shell 
that  is  fired  contains  a  nose  that  comes  off  at 
the  time  for  which  it  is  set,  and  liberates  hun- 
dreds of  small  round  leaden  bullets.  These  go 

90 


ARTILLERY  FIRE  91 

out  in  cone  shape  and  spray  the  ground  round 
about.  Shrapnel  is  very  effective  against  men 
in  the  open  but  of  little  use  when  they  are  en- 
trenched, for  very  few  of  the  bullets  from  any 
shell  will  enter  the  ditch  itself.  When  the  Brit- 
ish army  first  look  the  field  they  had  very  lit- 
tle H.  E.  Shrapnel  had  been  used  successfully 
in  South  Africa,  and  it  was  thought  it  would 
do  in  France.  The  proportions  used  were  96 
per  cent  shrapnel  to  4  per  cent  H.  E.  We  learnt 
our  lessons  dearly — as  we  usually  do — and  in 
time  we  came  to  realise  that  for  breaking  down 
parapets  shrapnel  was  absolutely  useless.  The 
proportion  that  is  now  used  is  about  90  per  cent 
H.  E.  to  10  per  cent  of  shrapnel. 

The  soldiers  used  to  call  the  77  mill,  shells 
of  the  Germans  "  Pip-squeaks. ' '  They  used  to 
give  a  "pip"  and  then  a  "squeak."  If  you 
heard  the  first  and  did  not  hear  the  second  you 
were  dead,  while,  if  you  heard  them  both  you 
could  consider  yourself  still  alive.  Another  fa- 
miliar name  for  them  was  that  of  "Cheeky 
Charlies,"  from  the  fact  that  they  had  the  habit 
of  coming  in  without  being  announced. 

In  addition  to  the  field  guns  there  are  the 
"Mediums"  or  guns  of  about  5  inches  calibre. 
The  familiar  name  for  the  German  shell  fired 
from  them  was  "the  Crump" — by  reason  of  the 


92      TRAINING  FOR  THE  TRENCHES 

fact  that  they  sat  down  alongside  you  with  a 
terrific  "Crump"  as  their  greeting.  As  in  the 
former  case,  those  who  could  report  having 
heard  the  "Crump"  were  still  alive. 

Then  there  are  various  long  range  guns  be- 
tween five  and  nine  inches  in  calibre.  But  long 
range  guns  do  not  play  the  part  that  high-angle 
or  Howitzer  guns  do.  The  Germans  wasted  a 
good  many  shells  in  firing  at  targets  even  as 
far  away  as  twenty-three  miles,  but  nowadays 
shells  are  usually  kept  for  targets  that  there  is 
a  fair  chance  of  hitting  and  not  for  blind  firing. 

The  Howitzer  that  has  come  to  play  a  very 
large  part  in  the  operations  of  the  British  is 
the  gun  that  is  familiarly  called  "  Mother  "r— a 
gun  of  9.2  inches  calibre  and  which  projects  a 
very  weighty  shell.  The  Germans  have  a  cor- 
responding gun  of  a  little  larger  bore. 

Last  of  all  there  come  the  great  guns  of  15 
and  16  inch  calibre.  These  guns  need  concrete 
foundations  and  cannot  be  set  up  in  a  hurry. 
Fortunately — for  them — the  Germans  had  a 
number  of  these  foundations  already  prepared 
in  unsuspecting  France  and  Belgium  long  be- 
fore the  war.  Our  own  gun  of  this  size  we  call 
"Grandmother."  The  shells  that  fall  from  the 
German  guns  of  the  largest  size  we  call  by  vari- 
ous names — either  "Bertha  Krupps"  from  the 


ARTILLERY  FIRE  93 

name  of  the  proprietress  of  the  great  gun  works 
at  Essen;  or  "Fat  Berthas"  for  the  same  rea- 
son; or  "Jack  Johnsons"  from  their  hard-hit- 
ting capacity ;  or  "  coal  boxes, "  "  black  inarias, ' ' 
etc.,  etc.  The  effect  of  these  shells  was  terrific, 
as  may  be  imagined,  but  there  were  many  occa- 
sions when  they  pierced  so  deep  into  the  soft 
ground  that  a  good  deal  of  the  force  of  their 
explosion  was  lost.  Of  course  for  work  against 
forts  there  is  nothing  like  them.  They  opened 
the  eyes  of  the  world  from  their  terrible  de- 
structive force  shown  at  Liege  and  Namur. 

Akin  to  shells  in  their  effects  are  the  now 
familiar  bombs.  These  are  of  all  varieties  and 
sizes.  They  range  from  the  small  hand  grenade 
that  is  about  the  size  of  an  ordinary  lemon  and 
is  simply  heaved  into  the  opposing  trench  by 
the  soldiers,  to  the  immense  bombs  weighing 
two  hundred  and  fifty  pounds  that  are  thrown 
from  trench  mortars,  or  guns  of  short  barrel 
and  very  wide  mouths.  It  was  a  long  time  be- 
fore the  British  army  appreciated  the  value  of 
bombs  and  we  could  not  get  a  supply  of  them. 
The  "Tommies"  set  to  work  to  manufacture 
them  in  the  trenches  and  a  good  many  lives  were 
lost  there  through  premature  explosions. 

Practice  is  absolutely  necessary  before  a  man 
is  fit  to  be  allowed  to  handle  a  live  bomb.  He 


94       TRAINING  FOR  THE  TRENCHES 

should  be  trained  first  of  all  to  throw  a  tin 
filled  with  stones,  and  learn  the  trick  of  letting 
it  go  at  the  correct  moment.  The  first  time  a 
man  throws  a  bomb  he  is  simply  anxious  to 
get  rid  of  it  without  any  regard  for  the  time 
the  fuse  has  been  burning.  Most  fuses  now 
are  five  seconds  and  that  time  must  be  calcu- 
lated to  a  nicety  to  get  the  best  results.  If  a 
bomb  is  thrown  too  soon,  the  enemy  may  pick 
it  up  and  throw  it  back — this  has  happened 
many  hundreds  of  times.  It  should  be  retained 
in  the  hand  during  the  first  and  second  seconds 
at  least  and  then  thrown  so  as  to  explode  OVER 
the  enemy  trench  on  the  fifth  second.  Our  men 
were  taught  to  get  out  of  the  way  of  bombs 
coming  into  the  trenches  if  they  could — there  is 
no  use  staying  to  be  blown  up  under  ordinary 
trench  conditions — but  if  they  were  under  such 
circumstances  that  they  could  not  get  out  of 
the  way  they  were  supposed  to  catch  them  and 
throw  them  away,  or  throw  them  back  as  hastily 
as  possible.  Men  become  experts  in  this  just 
as  they  do  in  catching  base  balls.  Where  a 
bomb  could  not  be  picked  up  and  endangered 
the  lives  of  men  in  the  trench  who  could  not 
get  away  from  it,  men  have  often  thrown  their 
bodies  upon  it,  and  thus,  in  a  most  gallant  and 


ARTILLERY  FIRE  95 

self-sacrificing  way,  given  their  lives  for  their 
comrades. 

Of  course  catching  them  is  out  of  the  ques- 
tion when  it  comes  to  the  large  bombs.  Ab- 
sence of  body  then  is  better  than  all  the  pres- 
ence of  mind.  When  they  actually  hit  the  trench 
— which  is  a  very  difficult  thing  to  do — they 
do  frightful  damage.  But  when  they  miss 
their  mark  they  usually  open  up  a  lot  of  earth 
either  before  or  behind  the  trench,  and  perhaps 
lay  out  a  man  or  two  with  concussion. 

Of  the  same  variety  are  aerial  torpedoes 
which  are  simply  bombs  with  flanges  on  their 
tails  to  give  them  direction. 

Sometimes  the  bombs  that  were  sent  over 
were  not  H.  E.  in  the  sense  that  they  exploded 
a  steel  shell  that  sent  its  various  pieces  large 
and  small  hurtling  through  the  air,  but  were 
simply  large  oil  drums  with  a  quantity  of  H.  E. 
in  them.  Men  were  killed  right  and  left,  not 
from  being  hit  with  anything,  but  merely  from 
having  been  in  the  neighbourhood  when  they  ex- 
ploded. 

Rifle  grenades  are  a  form  of  bomb  on  the 
end  of  a  stick  that  fits  into  the  muzzle  of  the 
rifle  and  is  then  discharged  by  means  of  a  blank 
cartridge.  They  are  effective  only  at  short  dis- 
tances. Indeed,  even  with  trench  mortars,  the 


96      TRAINING  FOR  THE  TRENCHES 

projectiles  can  seldom  be  hurled  more  than  four 
hundred  yards,  so  that  they  are  almost  always 
used  on  the  fire  trenches  and  are  never  directed 
to  trenches  farther  back. 


CHAPTER  IX 

GAS  AND  LIQUID  FIBE 

ANEW  and  deadly  form  of  warfare  is  the 
use  of  GAS.  Until  April,  1915,  we  knew 
nothing  about  it  and  then  we  had  to 
face  it  to  our  great  cost.  We  had  no  masks 
and  no  apparatus  of  any  kind  to  help  us  com- 
bat it.  Having  been  taken  by  surprise  in  an 
engagement  that  almost  cost  us  Calais,  we  set 
to  work  to  devise  means  to  counteract  it.  The 
method  adopted  is  the  helmet,  made  of  cloth, 
and  very  much  like  a  fireman's  smoke  helmet. 
It  has  large  goggles  similar  to  the  ones  that 
motorists  wear.  The  cloth  is  kept  saturated 
with  a  solution  of  ammonia  which  acts  as  a  neu- 
traliser  of  the  chlorine  gas.  A  tube  passes 
through  the  cloth  into  the  mouth,  and  through 
this  tube  the  air  from  the  lungs  is  breathed  out. 
It  is,  of  course,  fatal  to  inhale  air  through  it, 
and  all  the  air  that  is  breathed  in  has  to  be  in- 
haled through  the  cloth  of  the  helmet. 

The  importance  of  training  the  soldier  to  be 

97 


98       TRAINING  FOR  THE  TRENCHES 

able  to  meet  gas  cannot  be  overemphasised.  He 
should  be  drilled  frequently  with  the  helmet  on 
to  accustom  him  to  the  feeling  of  it,  and  alarms 
should  be  sounded  from  time  to  time  to  teach 
him  to  don  the  helmet  as  rapidly  as  possible. 
In  some  of  the  military  schools  in  France  the 
men  were  actually  taken  without  helmets  into 
chambers  where  there  was  just  enough  gas  to 
make  them  realise  it  was  there,  and  were  then 
sent  into  other  chambers  with  a  " deadly"  mix- 
ture of  gas  with  their  helmets  on.  This  train- 
ing makes  them  realise  the  importance  of  hel- 
mets. 

Many  forms  of  helmets  have  been  used  from 
time  to  time,  and  in  this  matter  as  in  many 
others  we  have  learnt  from  our  enemies.  For 
the  most  recent  British  mask  contains  the 
"nosebox"  or  "beak"  which  conforms  to  the 
German  model.  As  in  most  other  things,  sim- 
plicity is  to  be  desired  where  it  can  be  combined 
with  effectiveness,  and  it  is  the  simplicity  of 
the  cloth  helmet  with  the  tube  that  even  to-day 
commends  it  to  many  critics  above  the  "box" 
forms — those  that  require  an  independent  sup- 
ply of  oxygen.  Where  men  such  as  gunners  are 
liable  to  be  exposed  to  fumes  for  some  consider- 
able length  of  time,  either  from  cylinder  gas  or 
from  shells  or  even  from  tear  shells,  or  must 


GAS  AND  LIQUID  FIRE  99 

continue  at  their  posts  at  any  costs,  an  inde- 
pendent fresh  air  supply  is  necessary. 

Detailed  instruction  also  should  be  given  as 
to  what  men  are  to  do  during  and  after  the  gas 
attacks;  for  there  are  some  forms  of  gas  that 
do  not  appear  te  affect  the  individual  at  all,  and 
then  all  of  a  sudden,  when  he  begins  to  use  his 
limbs,  he  drops  dead  from  heart  failure.  In- 
struction on  this  subject  must  come  from  the 
medical  and  chemical  experts  who  have  made  a 
close  study  of  the  effects  of  gas. 

Allied  to  gas  is  LIQUID  FIKE.  This  fire  is 
projected  in  long  streams  from  the  nozzles  of 
pipes  that  come  from  a  high  pressure  cylinder, 
sometimes  placed  in  the  bottom  of  the  trench, 
and  sometimes  carried  on  the  backs  of  special 
men.  These  globules  of  burning  oil  that  are 
sent  forth  reach  a  distance  of  thirty  or  forty 
feet  from  the  nozzle  of  the  pipe.  The  effect  of 
liquid  fire  is  more  terrible  than  words  can  tell, 
and  it  requires  great  bravery  on  the  part  of 
troops  to  have  them  advance  in  the  face  of  these 
streams. 

Clouds  of  SMOKE  as  well  as  gas  are  used. 
One  of  the  ruses  that  was  adopted  at  the  battle 
of  Loos  was  to  project  smoke  forward  for  a  few 
minutes  until  the  enemy  should  become  quite 
used  to  it,  and  then  send  out  streams  and  waves 


100    TRAINING  FOR  THE  TRENCHES 

of  gas  to  take  him  unawares.  These  are  fright- 
ful  methods  of  warfare  which  the  Allies  have 
had  to  turn  to  in  order  not  to  allow  the  enemy, 
from  his  violation  of  his  pledged  word,  and 
contrary  to  the  rules  of  warfare,  to  gain  an  un- 
fair advantage.  But  there  are  many  of  us  who 
believe  that  no  other  enemy  than  the  Germans 
would  have  descended  to  these  depths  of  in- 
famy. 


CHAPTER  X 

Sri 

THE  ATTACK — DEFENCE 

SOONER  or  later  in  the  course  of  his  trench 
experience  the  soldier  will  be  subjected 
to  an  infantry  attack.  Artillery  shelling, 
aeroplane  attacks,  mining,  etc.,  are  part  of 
everyday 's  programme,  but  infantry  attacks 
come  only  now  and  then.  They  may  come  at 
any  time  and  the  enemy  is  not  in  the  habit  of 
announcing  them  beforehand.  It  is  not  likely 
that  they  will  occur  in  broad  daylight  without 
any  warning.  If  they  are  to  be  made  then,  they 
will  be  preceded  always  by  a  concentrated  ar- 
tillery preparation.  Night  is  the  danger  time. 
There  are  two  periods  of  special  danger — one, 
the  hour  before  sunrise,  and  the  other  the  hour 
after  sunset.  At  these  times  there  is  sufficient 
light  for  men  to  be  able  to  see  their  way  to  ad- 
vance over  almost  any  ground,  and  not  sufficient 
light  for  the  defending  force  to  be  able  to  take 
careful  sight  with  their  rifles  and  machine  gunsr 
etc.  Consequently  these  hours  are  the  most 
favourable  for  making  an  attack,  and  every  one 

101 


TRAINING  FOR  THE  TRENCHES 

ir-ust  ba  on  tho  abrt  to  ward  them  off.  These 
times  are  called  "  Stand  tos"  or  properly 
" Stand  to  arms."  While  they  last,  every  offi- 
cer and  every  man  of  the  front  and  support  line 
is  on  duty.  Eifles  are  cleaned,  inspected  and 
loaded,  bombs,  gas-masks,  revolvers,  bayonets, 
etc.,  are  got  ready,  and  every  one  remains  at  his 
post  of  duty.  In  the  blackness  of  night  and  in 
the  broad  light  of  day  the  danger  is  much  less 
and  consequently  some  of  the  force  can  be  re- 
lieved for  other  tasks,  during  the  night,  or  for 
rest  during  the  day. 

Should  an  attack  be  made,  it  becomes  the  bus- 
iness of  the  men  in  the  trench  to  hold  the  enemy 
off  just  as  long  as  they  can,  at  whatever  cost  to 
themselves,  while  some  one  telegraphs  back  for 
the  supports  and  reserves,  and  possibly  for  the 
assistance  of  the  artillery.  Trenches  must  never 
be  surrendered  without  giving  these  fresh  men 
a  chance  to  regain  the  advantage,  and  should 
the  trench  be  lost,  a  counter  attack  must  be  im- 
mediately arranged  before  the  enemy  has  had 
time  to  reverse  the  trenches  and  connect  them 
up  by  saps  and  communicating  trenches  with 
his  own  system.  No  time  must  be  lost,  for  the 
longer  the  delay,  the  greater  the  difficulty  of 
making  the  counter  attack  successful. 

As  to   the  methods   of  holding  the  trench 


THE  ATTACK— DEFENCE      103 

against  an  infantry  attack,  it  will  be  evident 
that  the  men  must  take  up  their  position  on  the 
firing  step  and  fire  as  rapidly  and  as  steadily 
as  they  can.  Bombs  should  be  kept  and  thrown 
only  when  the  enemy  has  got  well  within  range 
for  them.  Machine  guns  can  do  effective  work 
of  course  and  the  artillery  should  be  communi- 
cated with  and  they  will  open  fire  with  shrap- 
nel. Where  ammunition  permits,  a  barrage  or 
curtain  of  fire  should  then  be  established  be- 
hind the  enemy's  front  line  to  prevent  him 
bringing  up  reserves  to  take  the  place  of  those 
that  have  fallen,  and  also  to  weaken  him  for 
the  time  when  a  counter  attack  on  him  has  to  be 
made.  Star  shells,  that  illuminate  the  ground, 
will  of  course  have  been  fired  to  give  the  ma- 
chine gunners  and  the  rifle  marksmen  a  better 
chance  to  find  their  targets. 

Obedience,  steadiness  and  tenacity  are  re- 
quired of  the  men,  and  only  training  and  ex- 
perience will  develop  these  excellent  soldierly 
qualities.  The  poor  type  of  soldier  will  either 
forget  to  use  his  weapon  altogether  or  else  fire 
wildly  and  uselessly.  An  infantry  attack  is  not  a 
pleasant  experience,  but  soldiers  must  be  taught 
to  expect  it,  and  that  it  will  probably  give  them 
the  opportunity  of  using  the  final  and  greatest 
weapon  of  the  infantryman — the  bayonet. 


CHAPTER  XI 

THE  ATTACK OFFENCE 

TRENCHES  can  only  be  considered  as  de- 
vices for  affording  temporary  protection 
during  the  time  that  preparations  are  be- 
ing made  for  delivering  an  attack.  No  one 
wants  to  remain  in  trenches  for  ever.  At  the 
best  it  is  a  miserable  kind  of  life,  and  from  a 
military  point  of  view,  it  gets  nowhere.  Nor 
is  it  capable  of  being  maintained  without  great 
loss  in  men.  So  costly  did  it  become  to  us,  and 
so  great  was  the  monotony  and  the  feeling  of 
helplessness,  that  we  welcomed  the  word  when, 
it  came  to  us  to  deliver  an  attack.  At  least  that 
would  bring  us  action,  and  give  a  variety  to 
life. 

During  the  first  year  of  the  war,  attacks  had 
almost  always  to  be  made  without  sufficient  ar- 
tillery preparation.  Even  at  the  Battle  of 
Neuve  Chapelle,  where  we  assembled  over  480 
guns  on  a  little  more  than  a  mile  of  front — a 
greater  collection  than  had  ever  been  got  to- 
gether in  history — we  had  not  sufficient  artil- 

104 


THE  ATTACK— OFFENCE  105 

lery  preparation  for  the  attack  that  was  to  be 
made.  There  were  enough  guns  but  not  enough 
shells  to  fire  from  them.  The  result  was  that 
much  of  the  enemy's  wire  was  still  intact  when 
the  infantry  rushed  over,  and  the  advance  was 
held  up  in  certain  important  points  where  we 
could  be  enfiladed. 

We  have  learnt  that  the  only  method  of  de- 
livering and  infantry  attack  against  prepared 
positions  is  to  give  them  a  thorough  hammer- 
ing with  shells.  Every  particle  of  wire  should 
be  destroyed,  so  as  to  eliminate  the  risk  of  men 
being  shot  down  as  they  attempt  to  pass  through 
it.  At  the  Battle  of  Loos  our  guns  bombarded 
their  lines  from  Monday  morning  to  Saturday 
morning,  and  kept  hammering  at  them  so  as  not 
to  give  them  a  chance  to  repair  either  their  wire 
or  their  parapets.  An  effective  curtain  of  fire 
was  established  at  the  same  time  to  render  it 
impossible  for  them  to  bring  food  and  supplies 
up  to  the  line  that  we  were  about  to  attack. 
For  the  last  ten  minutes  before  the  men  actually 
went  over  the  parapet,  there  was  a  perfect  tor- 
nado of  shells  falling  upon  and  behind  their 
lines.  Any  one  who  remained  at  his  post  alive 
during  the  previous  days  would  find  it  almost 
impossible  to  continue  there  during  this  deluge. 

If  the  artillery  preparation  is  adequate,  the 


106    TRAINING  FOR  THE  TRENCHES 

battle  is  half  over.  General  Haig's  successes 
on  the  Somme,  and  the  consequent  German  re- 
treat on  a  large  scale,  have  been  due,  in  the  first 
place  to  the  excellent  work  of  the  gunners.  Of 
course  the  gunners  themselves  have  been  de- 
pendent on  many  other  branches  of  the  service 
pre-eminent  among  which  is  the  aeroplane 
corps.  Targets  are  seldom  seen  by  the  gunners 
who  have  to  depend  for  their  information  on 
the  men  who  can  fly  ahead  and  come  back  with 
actual  photographs  of  the  positions  to  be  bom- 
barded. Too  great  emphasis  cannot  be  placed 
upon  the  work  of  these  gallant  flying  men.  Dur- 
ing the  battles  of  the  Somme,  they  have  not  only 
been  doing  this  reconnaissance  work  for  the 
gunners,  but  they  have  been  flying  very  low 
after  they  reached  the  enemy  territory  and 
using  their  machine  guns  on  the  advancing  or 
retreating  infantry.  So  low  did  they  fly,  in- 
deed, that  the  enemy  did  not  risk  firing  upon 
them  with  their  guns  for  fear  of  hitting  their 
own  men.  They  were  fairly  safe  as  far  as  the 
opposing  infantry  was  concerned  for  the  man 
in  the  machiije  is  well  protected  from  below  and 
at  the  sides  from  rifle  bullets. 

While  the  artillery  is  active,  the  junior  ar- 
tillery, the  bomb  gunners  must  also  get  to  work 


THE  ATTACK— OFFENCE  107 

to  throw  over  as  much  H.  E.  as  possible  to  break 
down  the  resistance  of  the  enemy. 

Then  again  there  is  the  gas,  which  has  now 
come  to  be  used  as  a  definite  part  of  an  offen- 
sive. Gas  is  conveyed  to  the  trenches  in  large 
drums,  under  ^pressure,  and  at  the  proper  mo- 
ment is  liberated  in  waves  against  the  enemy. 
It  should  be  in  the  hands  of  trained  men  who 
can  be  trusted  not  to  liberate  it  a  moment  be- 
fore the  time  comes. 

While  gas  has  proved  very  effective  under 
certain  circumstances — and  almost  decided  the 
fate  of  Calais  early  in  1915 — yet  it  is  obviously 
dependent  upon  the  weather  and  especially  the 
wind.  Even  if  the  direction  of  the  wind  is  cor- 
rect for  the  use  of  gas,  the  kind  of  wind  may  not 
be  suitable  at  the  moment.  The  wind  must  not 
be  high  nor  squally,  but  needs  to  be  low  and 
gentle,  just  sufficient  to  carry  the  gas  across  to 
the  opposing  trenches  without  dissipating  it  on 
the  journey.  Then  again  it  must  be  remem- 
bered that  it  can  seldom  reach  the  gunners  who 
may  open  up  intensive  fire  on  the  trenches  from 
which  it  is  being  liberated,  burst  the  drums  and 
make  the  place  untenable.  Of  course  all  the 
men  who  are  employed  in  liberating  gas  should 
be  warned  to  have  their  helmets  in  position  to 
guard  against  these  emergencies,  and  also 


108    TRAINING  FOR  THE  TRENCHES 

against  leaks  in  the  drums.  Gas  masks  must  be 
tested  daily  to  see  that  they  do  not  admit  any 
of  this  deadly  poison. 

In  addition  to  these  preparations,  a  good 
many  reconnaissance  parties  must  be  sent  night 
after  night  out  into  No  Man's  Land  to  map  it 
thoroughly,  place  directing  boards  there,  dig 
small  saps  to  facilitate  an  advance,  and  learn 
the  condition  of  what  remains  of  the  enemy 
wire.  This  work  is  difficult  and  dangerous,  and 
must  be  given  to  trustworthy,  brave,  resource- 
ful men.  For  it  must  be  remembered  that  the 
enemy  will  probably  come  out  into  this  neutral 
territory  at  night  to  try  and  learn  the  plans  of 
the  opposing  side,  just  as  they  are  trying  to 
learn  his  plans.  Many  bloody  conflicts  have 
taken  place  out  there  under  cover  of  darkness 
when  the  patrol  from  one  side  has  entered  into 
conflict  with  the  patrol  from  the  other. 

Those  in  charge  of  the  attack  will  arrange 
that  at  a  specified  time  the  bombardment  will 
cease,  and  the  men  leap  over  the  parapets.  This 
time  is  usually  arranged  for,  say,  one  minute 
after  six,  or  thirteen  minutes  after  eight — some 
time  which  the  enemy  cannot  guess  accurately. 
During  the  final  awful  ten  minutes,  the  finishing 
touches  are  given  to  rifles  and  bombs  and  re- 
volvers. Then  exactly  at  the  appointed  time 


THE  ATTACK—OFFENCE  109 

the  electric  buzzers  in  the  trenches  sound  the 
signal  to  advance.  The  first  man  over  the  para- 
pet is  always  an  officer.  Unlike  the  Germans, 
we  do  not  drive  our  men  but  expect  them  to  fol- 
low us,  and  this  accounts  in  part  for  the  very 
severe  casualties  that  have  been  suffered  by 
British  officers. 

Where  the  distance  between  trenches  is  short, 
say,  a  couple  of  hundred  yards,  it  is  covered  as 
fast  as  men  can  run.  It  is  a  veritable  race  with 
death;  for  the  enemy  must  not  be  allowed  to 
recover  from  the  bombardment  in  time  to  get 
his  machine  guns  up  into  position  again  before 
the  infantry  arrives  before  his  trenches.  The 
attacking  infantry  must  throw  themselves  down 
into  the  trenches  and  begin  work  at  once  with 
bomb  and  bayonet.  Since  the  enemy  has  adopt- 
ed the  plan  of  having  his  dugouts  deep  down 
in  the  earth,  it  is  a  little  easier  to  reach  him 
before  he  is  able  to  emerge.  In  this  work  bombs 
are  most  effective.  All  of  the  enemy  communi- 
cating trenches  must  be  effectively  barricaded 
or  protected  by  bombers  and  riflemen  to  keep 
him  from  bringing  up  any  reserves  and  thus 
taking  the  attacking  force  from  a  flank.  In  an 
attack  of  this  kind  the  ground  cannot  be  cov- 
ered too  rapidly,  and  no  thought  must  be  given 
to  cover. 


110     TRAINING  FOR  THE  TRENCHES 

But  when  attacks  have  to  be  made  over  long 
distances,  the  plan  is  either  to  dig  out  saps  that 
will  reach  to  within  a  reasonable  charging  dis- 
tance of  the  enemy,  or  else  have  the  infantry 
proceed  at  a  moderate  and  steady  pace,  so  as 
not  to  arrive  at  their  objective  winded  and  use- 
less for  bayonet  work.  The  principle  of  hav- 
ing sectional  rushes  while  neighbouring  sec- 
tions open  rapid  fire  will  be  found  useful. 

The  German  method  of  advance  is  character- 
ised by  the  close  order  formation,  the  British 
by  the  open  order  formation.  The  German 
training  is  such  that  he  cannot  act  independ- 
ently to  any  very  great  degree,  but  needs  to  feel 
the  support  of  another  strong  arm  near  him,  if 
possible  touching  him.  They  attack  in  waves 
of  men  packed  so  closely  together  that  it  is 
impossible  to  miss  them  if  you  get  a  shot  at 
them  at  all,  and  of  course  they  are  ideal  marks 
for  machine  guns.  But  in  the  British  and 
French  armies  men  are  trained  to  be  self-reli- 
ant and  to  advance  even  when  they  seem  to  be 
alone.  An  interval  of  three  paces  is  usually 
maintained  between  individuals,  and  that  ren- 
ders them  less  of  a  target  for  marksmen.  They 
are  also  trained  to  take  command  of  other  men 
should  their  officers  or  non-commissioned  offi- 
cers be  put  out  of  action. 


THE  ATTACK— OFFENCE  111 

Should  any  of  the  enemy  wires  be  still  intact, 
they  must  be  cut  by  the  first  comers  so  as  not 
to  hold  up  the  main  attack.  This  is  done  by  or- 
dinary wire  cutters — which  every  man  is  sup- 
posed to  carry  as  part  of  his  equipment — or 
else  by  a  new  device  that  is  attached  to  certain 
rifles.  By  means  of  this  a  number  of  the  wires 
are  caught  together  and  then  when  the  rifle  is 
fired  the  bullet  cuts  them  and  a  passage  through 
is  made. 

If  the  trench  should  be  successfully  taken  and 
all  the  enemy  disposed  of,  the  first  work  to  be 
done  is  to  "  reverse "  it,  and  connect  it  up  by 
communicating  trenches  with  the  old  position. 
For  this  work  engineers  are  sent  immediately 
behind  the  infantry,  and  they  carry  with  them 
quantities  of  sand  bags  and  shovels  and  picks 
and  wire,  etc.,  with  which  to  complete  this  task. 
Of  course  the  infantry  must  also  help,  and  for 
this  purpose  it  will  be  as  well  for  each  man  to 
take  with  him  a  few  sandbags  on  his  back — not 
enough  to  encumber  him,  but  sufficient  to  be  of 
service  in  putting  up  hasty  defences. 

The  test  of  the  success  of  the  action  will  come 
as  soon  as  the  enemy  is  able  to  organise  a  coun- 
ter-attack. He  will  know  the  range  of  the  trench 
to  a  nicety  and  will  not  be  slow  to  hurl  the 
weight  of  his  shells  against  it.  Then,  too,  he 


TRAINING  FOR  THE  TRENCHES 

will  try  to  bring  up  reserves,  who  with  bayonet 
and  bomb  will  attack  their  old  position.  For 
many  weary  hours  the  infantry  may  be  busy  on 
this  task  of  repelling  counter  attacks,  and  con- 
solidating their  new  position. 

So  many  details  have  to  be  cared  for  in  an 
attack  that  it  is  well  to  rehearse  it  thoroughly 
beforehand  and  to  see  that  every  individual 
knows  just  exactly  where  he  is  supposed  to  be 
and  what  he  is  to  do.  Only  in  that  way  will  con- 
fusion be  avoided.  It  will  be  necessary  also  for 
the  attackers  to  wear  distinguishing  marks  in 
the  form  of  a  white  band  on  the  arm  or  a  white 
piece  of  cloth  on  the  back  if  the  attack  is  to  be 
made  in  the  darkness  or  with  poor  light. 

The  question  of  prisoners  inevitably  comes 
up.  What  is  to  be  done  with  them!  How  are 
they  to  be  taken  care  of?  It  will  be  seen  that 
this  is  a  big  problem  in  an  attack  where  men 
cannot  be  disengaged  from  their  tasks  of  taking 
trenches  without  greatly  weakening  the  opera- 
tion. To  tell  off  men  to  look  after  prisoners 
when  every  man  is  needed  to  break  down  the 
resistance  that  is  still  being  offered  by  others 
of  the  enemy,  is  a  procedure  obviously  sur- 
rounded with  dangers.  And  yet,  in  the  inter- 
ests of  humanity  it  has  to  be  done,  for  the  only 
other  alternative  is  to  take  no  prisoners.  At 


THE  ATTACK— OFFENCE  113 

the  battle  of  Loos  many  of  the  German  prison- 
ers that  we  took  came  to  us  in  embarrassing 
mobs.  They  were  weak  and  hungry  and  re- 
quired little  persuasion  to  lay  down  their  arms. 
Under  these  conditions  we  could  manage  a  great 
many  prisoners  with  a  few  armed  men.  Where 
they  surrendered  in  ones  and  twos  we  found 
there  was  a  disposition  on  the  part  of  some  of 
our  troops  to  disengage  themselves  from  the 
battle  to  lead  them  back.  A  man  is  naturally 
proud  of  the  fact  that  he  has  taken  a  prisoner 
and  wants  to  deliver  him  himself.  But  we  in- 
sisted that  they  be  turned  over  at  the  earliest 
opportunity  to  others  who  were  in  charge  of 
small  numbers  of  prisoners,  and  that  as  soon 
as  possible  they  be  given  into  the  charge  of  men 
who  were  slightly  wounded,  but  who  could  still 
be  relied  on  to  give  a  good  account  of  them- 
selves if  trouble  arose.  It  is  also  a  good  thing 
to  have  a  quantity  of  loose  telephone  wire  about 
—as  almost  always  happens  in  a  battle — and 
wind  this  round  the  prisoners,  making  sure  that 
they  keep  their  hands  in  the  air.  Even  barbed 
wire  will  do,  though  it  is  not  so  comfortable 
for  the  prisoners  concerned,  and  it  may  be  nec- 
essary to  relax  the  rule  about  keeping  both 
hands  up ! 
Eaids  are  attacks  on  a  small  scale,  and  on  a 


114     TRAINING  FOR  THE  TRENCHES 

definite  portion  of  the  enemy's  line.  They  are 
usually  carried  out  by  parties  varying  in  num- 
ber from  twenty  to  a  hundred  commanded  by 
one  or  more  officers.  Almost  the  same  prepa- 
ration as  for  an  attack  is  necessary  in  most 
cases  to  break  down  the  barbed  wire  before  the 
lines.  But  in  some  cases  they  are  carried  out 
as  surprises  and  then  other  means  must  be  re- 
lied on  to  overcome  the  difficulties  of  the  barbed 
wire.  As  in  the  case  of  attacks,  rehearsals  must 
precede  the  operation  itself  so  that  every  man 
will  know  exactly  what  he  is  supposed  to  do  and 
where  he  is  supposed  to  be.  In  a  recent  raid 
during  the  time  that  the  snow  was  on  the 
ground,  the  Canadians  secured  a  number  of 
women's  nightgowns  and  put  them  on  over  their 
uniforms.  In  this  remarkable  garb  they  pro- 
ceeded over  No  Man's  Land  to  visit  the  German 
lines. 

If  artillery  preparation  has  been  given,  that 
must  be  depended  on  to  have  broken  the  wires 
and  the  thing  to  be  done  then  is  to  reach  the 
enemy  parapets  before  they  have  time  to  re- 
cover and  bring  the  machine  guns  into  action. 
But  by  far  the  greater  number  of  raids  come 
as  surprises  to  the  enemy.  They  do  not  hear 
the  men  beyond  their  parapets  lying  on  their 
stomachs  and  busily  cutting  the  wires  with  their 


THE  ATTACK— OFFENCE  115 

snips.  The  first  they  know  of  it  is  when  a  bomb 
lands  in  the  trench  or  else  the  body  of  one  of 
the  attacking  infantrymen,  as  he  enters  their 
stronghold  to  begin  his  work  of  destruction.  In 
raiding  parties,  more  than  at  any  other  time  it 
is  well  to  remember  the  adage  that  "  silence  is 
golden/'  and  that  the  best  results  can  only  be 
obtained  if  every  man  is  determined  to  follow 
his  instructions  to  the  very  letter.  If  the  party 
is  cut  off  by  superior  forces  it  must  make  up  its 
mind  as  to  what  it  is  going  to  do,  though  most 
men,  I  am  sure,  will  prefer  to  fight  to  the  death 
rather  than  surrender. 


CHAPTER  XII 

EQUIPMENT   FOE   THE   FIELD 


fT^HE  question  is  often  asked  by  prospective 
soldiers  as  to  what  is  the  irreducible  min- 
imum that  a  man  should  take  to  war,  in 
the  way  of  equipment.  I  say  irreducible,  for  it 
is  to  the  interest  of  the  infantryman  who  has 
to  carry  practically  all  his  belongings  on  his 
back,  to  reduce  his  load  as  much  as  possible  con- 
sistent with  efficiency  and  comfort.  The  tailors 
in  London  who  undertook  the  tasks  of  equip- 
ping young  officers  for  the  trenches,  having 
more  interest  in  making  sales  than  anything 
else,  did  their  best  to  persuade  their  victims 
that  the  omission  of  one  of  dozens  of  things 
they  proposed  would  expose  them  to  very  grave 
risks.  No  one  could  possibly  have  carried  all 
the  equipment  they  suggested  and  no  Army 
Service  Corps  would  ever  have  been  able  to 
handle  it  as  baggage.  Some  of  the  men  who 
fell  victims  to  these  outfitters  went  to  France 
looking  more  like  "Xmas  trees  "  than  anything 
else,  for  it  was  only  when  there  was  no  more 

116 


EQUIPMENT  FOR  THE  FIELD        117 

room  on  their  bodies  to  hang  anything  that  these 
excellent  gentlemen  were  satisfied,  and  let  them 
depart. 

In  this  list  that  I  am  now  giving,  I  propose 
to  deal  with  the  equipment  of  the  soldier  first 
and  then  add4o  it  the  items  that  seem  to  me  to 
be  essential  for  the  Officer. 

First  of  all  there  is  the  rifle,  the  soldier's  best 
friend.  It  should  be  cherished  and  cared  ior 
as  though  his  life  depended  on  it — as  it  fre- 
quently may.  We  used  to  inspect  the  rifles  of 
the  men  at  least  twice  a  day  in  the  trenches,  and 
any  sign  of  neglect  was  at  once  dealt  with.  It 
must  be  kept  free  from  all  rust  and  dirt,  well 
oiled  and  polished,  and  with  every  part  of  the 
mechanism  in  first  class  working  condition. 
Any  text  book  on  musketry  will  give  the  infor- 
mation necessary  for  the  effective  care  of  the 
rifle.  We  found  that  the  breech  of  the  rifle  was 
often  in  danger  of  becoming  fouled  through 
mud  or  sand.  Accordingly  we  advised  the  men 
to  keep  that  part  covered  whenever  the  rifle  was 
not  in  action.  Small  khaki  cloths  with  snap 
buttons  were  made,  but  where  these  were  not 
obtainable,  the  leg  of  a  sock  served  quite  as 
well.  But  it  must  be  easily  removable. 

Eifles  are  sometimes  fouled  through  putting 
into  them  cartridges  that  are  rusty  or  muddy. 


118     TRAINING  FOR  THE  TRENCHES 

All  cartridges  should  be  cleaned  before  being 
inserted.  Now  it  is  obvious  that  time  cannot  be 
taken  for  this  task  during  an  engagement,  and 
so  it  must  be  done  before  the  rifle  is  to  be  used. 
As  the  cartridges  come  from  the  factory  they 
are  perfectly  clean;  but  if  they  are  carried 
about  for  days  and  weeks  in  the  carriers  on  the 
•equipment  they  get  very  dirty.  Officers  must 
inspect  them  from  time  to  time  and  see  that 
damaged  ones  are  sent  away  and  not  allowed 
to  be  fired  through  the  rifles.  No  care  can  be 
too  great.  It  is  a  pitiful  sight  to  see  a  man  in 
action  with  a  rifle  that  has  become  clogged 
through  carelessness.  It  is  a  good  thing  to  give 
rewards  for  those  who  consistently  present 
clean  rifles  for  inspection,  and  to  punish  those 
who  do  not.  When  a  man  realises  how  much  he 
is  dependent  on  his  rifle  he  will  be  certain  to 
take  care  of  it. 

The  next  thing  is  the  bayonet.  I  have  said 
that  all  infantry  work  leads  up  to  the  use  of 
the  bayonet,  and  so,  if  a  man  is  to  be  ready  for 
this  final  test,  his  bayonet  must  be  in  good 
shape.  Of  course  there  is  not  much  to  get  out 
of  order,  but  there  are  a  few  movable  parts  that 
must  be  kept  oiled,  and  the  blade  itself  which 
must  be  kept  clean.  It  is  a  slight  courtesy  that 


EQUIPMENT  FOR  THE  FIELD        119 

you  can  pay  your  enemy,  that  you  give  him 
clean,  instead  of  rusty,  steel. 

Another  weapon  that  has  proved  itself  indis- 
pensable in  this  war  is  the  entrenching  tool.  It 
is  a  small  instrument  with  a  detachable  handle, 
and  the  head  Itself  has  a  shovel  at  one  end  and 
a  pick  at  the  other.  It  is  a  wonderful  little  tool 
for  hasty  entrenching  and  no  attack  should  be 
made  without  it.  It  has  been  the  means  of  sav- 
ing many,  many  lives  in  this  war. 

Unfortunately,  the  perfidy  of  the  enemy  has 
made  necessary  another  addition  to  the  equip- 
ment of  every  soldier,  and  that  is  the  gas  mask. 
The  best  kind  consists  of  heavy  khaki  cloth, 
kept  wet  with  a  solution  to  counteract  and  neu- 
tralise the  chlorine  in  the  gas,  and  equipped 
with  goggles  very  much  like  what  motorists 
wear,  and  a  tube  that  enters  the  mouth.  The 
air  to  be  breathed  is  drawn  in  through  the  cloth 
itself,  and  the  air  that  has  been  used  is  driven 
out  through  the  tube.  It  is  not  a  comfortable 
process  but  it  is  considerably  better  than  im- 
bibing deadly  gas. 

Of  course  a  water  bottle  must  be  carried  and 
must  always  be  kept  clean.  On  every  possible 
occasion  the  soldier  should  wash  it  out  with  hot 
water  and  some  form  of  disinfectant.  Men 
should  be  discouraged  from  rushing  to  their  wa- 


120    TRAINING  FOR  THE  TRENCHES 

ter  bottles  for  drinks  at  all  times,  especially 
when  they  are  on  the  march.  Thirst  is  a  thing 
that  we  can  easily  control  if  we  will. 

We  learnt  that  it  was  an  excellent  practice  to 
to  have  strapped  about  the  equipment  in  a  place 
where  they  could  easily  be  got  at,  two  sandbags. 
They  are  not  heavy  or  bulky  to  carry,  and  if 
hasty  cover  is  needed  they  will  be  found  in- 
valuable. 

Lists  of  the  clothes  necessary  are  given  in 
every  military  manual,  and  it  will  be  well  to 
follow  the  one  for  the  special  army  to  which 
you  belong.  Besides,  the  clothing  necessary 
will  vary  according  to  the  climate  in  which  the 
troops  have  to  serve.  Quite  obviously  the 
equipment  for  the  Philippines  will  be  different 
from  the  equipment  for  France.  But  we  found 
that  it  was  a  good  plan  to  have  warm  under- 
clothes for  the  winter,  not  the  heaviest  variety, 
but  reasonably  heavy.  It  is  better  and  more 
convenient  to  add  to  the  clothing  should  occa- 
sion warrant  it  rather  than  carry  heavy  under- 
clothes all  the  time.  In  summer  the  under- 
clothing should  be  light.  But  whatever  the  sea- 
son, a  change  should  be  carried  in  the  pack  on 
the  back.  In  the  case  of  socks  two  or  three 
emergency  pairs  should  be  in  the  pack.  These 
socks  should  be  made  of  wool,  preferably  un- 


EQUIPMENT  FOR  THE  FIELD 

dyed,  and  should  be  thick  and  heavy  for  all 
times.  I  am  aware  that  it  is  much  nicer  to  have 
thin  silk  socks  for  the  summer  time,  but  they 
are  not  intended  for  marching  in  nor  yet  for 
use  with  heavy  military  boots. 

Two  pairs"bf  boots  should  be  taken,  one  pair 
on  the  feet  and  one  pair  in  the  pack.  Tennis 
shoes  should  also  be  carried  to  put  on  at  times 
to  rest  the  feet. 

I  need  scarcely  indicate  what  toilet  articles 
are  needed,  for  they  are  the  same  on  service 
as  would  be  taken  for  a  week-end  at  the  seaside. 
But  I  would  add  that  it  is  a  good  thing  to  in- 
clude a  cake  of  strong  carbolic  soap  to  discour- 
age the  lice. 

Emergency  bandages,  sewn  into  the  tunic, 
may  be  the  means  of  saving  your  life. 

Some  means  must  be  adopted  for  protecting 
the  ears  from  the  noises  of  the  rifles  and  bombs 
and  shells.  Cotton  wool  will  serve,  but  a  much 
better  device  is  on  the  market,  called  "Ear  De- 
fenders. "  They  are  small  vulcanite  cylinders 
that  are  inserted  into  the  ears.  Near  the  end  of 
the  cylinder  there  is  a  diaphragm  of  fine  gauze 
which  is  pushed  up  against  the  wall  by  the 
sound  waves  created  by  great  noises  (thus  pro- 
tecting the  drum  of  the  ear)  while  they  do  not 
respond  at  all  to  the  waves  from  small  sounds. 


TRAINING  FOR  THE  TRENCHES 

Consequently  it  is  quite  possible  to  hear  the 
words  of  a  person  speaking,  and  not  be  affected 
by  the  noise  of  the  guns.  I  have  used  them  my- 
self and  can  vouch  for  their  efficacy,  though  it 
does  take  a  little  time  to  become  used  to  them. 

Then  again  nearly  every  soldier  will  need  a 
wrist  watch.  These  should  be  luminous,  for 
there  is  much  waste  of  time  involved  in  striking 
a  match  or  going  to  a  lamp  to  see  the  time.  It 
pays  to  buy  a  good  watch,  and  by  all  means  get 
a  removable  cover  for  the  glass  face,  for  glasses 
easily  break,  and  it  is  difficult  to  get  them  re- 
paired on  service. 

I  do  not  intend  this  list  to  be  exhaustive,  but 
to  contain  the  most  important  things  that  a  sol- 
dier will  need  to  include  in  this  equipment. 

Officers  are  allowed  more  baggage,  and  will 
need  more,  but  the  mistake  must  not  be  made 
of  overloading  or  taking  unnecessary  things. 
They  will  need  a  canvas  valise  and  a  sleeping 
bag  to  go  with  it,  and,  if  possible,  a  very  light 
mattress,  weighing  not  more  than  a  few  pounds. 
A  canvas  water  bucket  and  a  wash  basin,  and  a 
change  of  uniform  are  very  necessary.  As  to 
weapons,  I  found  that  the  Colt  automatic  was 
very  serviceable.  Swords  are  of  course  not  car- 
ried in  France.  They  are  a  nuisance  for  most 
purposes,  though  they  do  make  excellent  toast- 


EQUIPMENT  FOR  THE  FIELD 

ing  forks.  In  action  we  led  our  men,  equipped 
only  with  revolver  and  cane.  In  raids  and 
trench  work  a  handy  instrument  is  the  trench 
dagger — a  knife  of  about  nine  inches  long,  end- 
ing in  a  handle  that  has  openings  for  the  four 
fingers  to  go  through,  thus  serving  as  a 
"knuckle  duster."  Field  glasses  are  essential 
and  indeed  they  should  be  supplied  to  some  of 
the  non-commissioned  officers  as  well.  Nothing 
under  four  nor  over  eight  diameters  should  be 
chosen.  Below  that  figure  they  do  not  magnify 
enough,  and  above  that  figure  they  magnify  too 
much.  Six  or  seven  is  ideal  for  the  infantry- 
man. 

Some  form  of  collapsible  periscope  may  be 
carried,  but  most  of  us  discarded  the  ones  we 
had  bought  in  England  in  favour  of  the  simple 
ones  that  I  have  described  in  another  place. 

I  would  utter  again  the  warning  against  load- 
ing up  with  too  many  things.  Get  few  things 
but  get  good  ones  and  keep  them  good  is  the 
best  advice  that  I  can  give. 


CHAPTER  XIII 

TKICKS  FOR  THE  TRENCHES 

A  CLOSING  word  should  be  said  on  the 
subject  of  trench  ruses.  As  in  every 
other  form  of  warfare,  deception  must 
be  practised  on  the  enemy.  He  must  be  made 
to  believe  you  are  doing  things  that  you  are  not 
doing  and  that  you  propose  doing  things  that 
are  not  in  your  plans  at  all.  Any  number  of 
these  ruses  will  occur  to  the  minds  of  my  read- 
ers, and  I  want  to  mention  a  few  of  them  that 
we  actually  tried. 

One  of  the  best  ruses  is  to  let  the  enemy  get 
hold  of  fake  orders.  These  can  be  placed  on 
bodies  immediately  after  an  action  and  there 
will  be  a  good  chance  of  the  enemy  accepting 
them  as  genuine.  "We  have  reason  to  believe 
that  some  of  the  prisoners  that  we  took  came 
over  for  the  purpose  of  letting  false  orders  fall 
into  our  hands.  It  is  pretty  hard  on  the  indi- 
vidual to  make  him  the  goat  in  this  way  and  I 
do  not  recommend  it. 

Making  elaborate  preparations  for  an  attack 

124 


TRICKS  FOR  THE  TRENCHES        125 

in  one  spot,  and  then  actually  attacking  from  an- 
other point  when  his  reserves  have  been  drawn 
to  the  first  point,  also  used  to  work  well. 

It  is  well  to  learn  the  calls  and  signals  of  the 
enemy  for  us^  during  an  attack,  and  thus  to 
throw  his  men  into  disorder.  There  have  been 
Germans  in  this  war  who  carried  out  the  dar- 
ing ruse  of  appearing  in  our  lines  in  the  uni- 
forms of  staff  officers  and  giving  orders  to  our 
men.  They  were  brave  individuals  and  scarcely 
seem  to  merit  the  swift  punishment  that  came 
to  them  on  detection. 

In  the  trenches  it  was  sometimes  necessary 
to  move  about  the  few  men  that  we  had  and  to 
keep  them  firing  first  in  one  place  and  then  in 
another  to  convey  the  impression  that  we  were 
in  considerable  force. 

Buses  had  to  be  adopted  to  discover  snipers. 
On  one  occasion  I  needed  to  find  a  sniper  who 
had  just  killed  three  of  my  men,  and  was  such 
an  excellent  shot  that  he  broke  my  periscope. 
For  this  purpose  I  made  a  dummy  man  out  of 
sand  bags  and  had  a  soldier  put  him  cautiously 
above  the  parapet  (head  only)  while  I  observed 
from  a  neighbouring  bay.  I  detected  him  from 
the  dust  that  his  bullet  raised  from  his  parapet, 
and  a  few  well  aimed  artillery  shots  put  him 


126     TRAINING  FOR  THE  TRENCHES 

and  his  loop  hole  out  of  business.  My  poor 
dummy  was  badly  wounded  in  the  process. 

The  Turks  in  Gallipoli  used  to  paint  some  of 
their  snipers  a  green  colour  and  send  them  out 
between  the  lines  among  the  small  bushes. 

A  pretended  retreat  will  sometimes  lure  the 
enemy  from  his  trenches  to  destruction. 

Sending  out  patrols  in  one  section  to  draw 
fire  while  careful  reconnaissance  work  is  being 
done  at  another  spot  will  sometimes  find  him 
off  his  guard. 

Dummy  guns,  of  course,  have  played  a  large 
part,  and  have  been  responsible  for  the  waste 
of  a  great  deal  of  ammunition.  They  are  placed 
where  they  can  be  observed  by  the  aeroplanes, 
who  promptly  report  their  presence.  It  is  said 
that  at  the  Dardanelles  the  forts  once  opened 
fire  on  the  battleship  Queen  Elizabeth. 
After  a  while  they  sank  her — and  her  guns 
floated  off!  It  is  telling  no  secret  now  to  say 
that  many  of  the  units  in  the  British  navy  had 
duplicates  constructed  out  of  old  vessels.  Their 
business  was  to  draw  fire  to  themselves  while 
other  craft  did  the  work.  Hence  the  wooden 
guns.  They  served  another  purpose  as  well,  for 
it  was  very  difficult  for  spies  to  inform  Ger- 
many where  the  real  fighting  ships  were  at  any 
time. 


TRICKS  FOR  THE  TRENCHES        127 

In  short,  the  whole  business  is  to  "get  the 
enemy 's  goat. ' '  Keep  him  guessing.  Wear  him 
down  with  worrying.  Break  his  nerve  and  spoil 
his  sleep,  that  his  physical  resistance  may  be 
weakened.  On  the  other  hand,  learn  to  esti- 
mate the  intention  on  the  enemy.  Do  not  under- 
rate him.  In  all  cases  and  under  all  circum- 
stances follow  out  the  excellent  motto  of  the 
Boy  Scouts — 

BE    PREPARED. 


14  DAY  USE 

TO  DESK  FROM  WHICH  BORROWED 

J   \ 


sag*. 


YB  04330 


3667< 


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